


don't want your crown

by freosan



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: AU where Noct dies but worse this time, Dark!Noct, F/M, Life-Affirming Sex, Post-Canon, honestly I feel worst for Ignis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:48:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27581603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/freosan/pseuds/freosan
Summary: "He should’ve stayed in the Crystal. If it was going to be like this. We should’ve stayed in the dark.”“You can’t mean that,” Iris protests, but he thinks it’s just for something to say. She wraps her fingers around his and squeezes.“It’s not just about the world. It’s him. He’s against everything he used to stand for. I promised him we’d knock down the borders. He didn’t want anybody to fight because of where they were born. And now he’s like this. I’d do better getting what he wanted than he is…”Prompto stops, because thatistreason. He’s never worried about that before but he grew up in a monarchy and he knows the rules. Even under Regis you could get in trouble for saying stuff like that and meaning it.Under Noct, you can end up dead for it.Iris is looking at him very thoughtfully. “Would you?” she asks. “I don’t want to move against the King if I can help it, Prompto. But…. Would you?”
Relationships: Iris Amicitia/Prompto Argentum
Comments: 2
Kudos: 29
Collections: FFXV Rarepair Big Bang 2020





	don't want your crown

Prompto can’t quite believe what he’s doing as he snaps the cuffs on Cor Leonis’s wrists. He hasn’t been nervous at an arrest in ages - and there are always plenty of them - but it’s _the Marshal_. It’s surreal.

They wouldn’t have caught up to Cor if it hadn’t been for a streak of wild good luck. Prompto and Gladio happened to both be out patrolling the Insomnian border; they happened to meet up just before they stumbled on Cor’s camp; Cor had just come back from a long solo trip to Niflheim and was exhausted and out of curatives.

They’ve been looking for him for nearly six weeks now, ever since he showed up in a video feed from Gralea, handing off a package to two MTs. Noct nearly set fire to the monitor they watched on, he was so angry.

Now they have him, though, so maybe Noct can chill out a little. Prompto can see the relief in Gladio’s eyes as they herd Cor into the back of the truck. Prompto drives, thank the Astrals. Gladio sits in back and keeps their prisoner from busting out.

The whole time Prompto wonders if they’re talking, and if so what they’re talking about. Cor’s got to know he’s headed for a harsh sentence, but he doesn’t seem to want to fight. Prompto doesn’t hear a peep from them until they pull up in the Citadel courtyard.

Court’s in session. It pretty much always is. Noct doesn’t sleep much anymore, and if he’s awake, he’s more likely than not to be on the throne or in the basement room where the Crystal sits. It’s been weird, getting used to that. Prompto takes Cor’s arm on one side, Gladio takes the other, and they march Cor right up past all the Crownsguard and into the throne room.

Gladio shoves Cor until he kneels. It’s not a very Gladio-like move, but Prompto sees Noct’s nod when Cor’s knees hit the floor. All of it’s a show. The assembled nobility is going to see Cor humiliated and, for some reason, Noct thinks that’s a good idea. Sometimes Prompto doesn’t even _want_ to know what goes on in his head.

“Where’d you find him?” Noct asks, his head resting on his left hand as he slouches on the throne. There’s a ball of fire in his other hand - he’s always playing with magic, lately. Ignis stands at his right and flinches when the fire comes too close to him. Prompto misses when Noct noticed, or cared, or was _sorry_ about that kind of thing.

“One of the havens out on the border,” Gladio says. He sounds tired. Prompto makes himself stand sharply to attention, his face blank, because he doesn’t want Noct to think either of them are having second thoughts about bringing Cor in. “He’s not talking, but he was handing stuff off to the Nifs.”

“I thought so.” Noct sits up straight, looking down on Cor. Cor’s head is up, his back as straight as it can be given Gladio’s heavy hand on his shoulder. He looks pissed, and Prompto remembers back when that used to scare Noct. “What would my dad say if he knew _you_ turned traitor?”

Cor’s voice, when he speaks up, sounds rusty, but he projects loud enough for them to hear him in the back of the room. “He’d say, ‘Thank you for leading when my son couldn’t’. Your Majesty.” And he spits on the stone floor.

There’s silence. Noct’s eyes flash with weird red light and Prompto braces for a lightning bolt to come down from the ceiling. But before Noct can go off, Ignis puts a hand on his shoulder and leans down to say something in his ear. Noct huffs a sigh and sits back on the throne. “Take him to the cells. He’ll be executed tomorrow.”

The sentence, in Noct’s quiet, firm voice, comes down with the weight of Titan’s fist. The echoes ring out around the room. Prompto feels his stomach drop into his knees.

He can’t contradict Noct. He doesn’t think Noct will have _him_ executed, though maybe that’s more him clinging to hope than anything, but he knows Ignis will have him made an example of. It happened a couple of times in the first year after Noct came back, before they all got used to how things are now.

Noct is looking at Prompto now, and Prompto forces himself to meet his eyes. There’s still red light in them. “Good work, Gladio, Prompto. Both of you go with him, I don’t want to take any chances.”

Gladio doesn’t look at Prompto as they march Cor down to the cells. They’re pretty full these days, but Cor’s a special case - they shuffle prisoners around so Cor can have one to himself. He sits on the empty bed and stares straight ahead, refusing to speak or even acknowledge them as Gladio locks the door on him.

***

Prompto waits until Noct’s gone to bed to try again. He’d leave it for a few days, until Noct got distracted with something else, but Noct hasn’t left him that kind of time. Luckily, he’s close enough to Noct that some of the terror the Dawn King inspires rubs off on him. The guards let him right in to see Cor without any argument.

Cor hasn’t moved since Prompto left him earlier that day. There’s a tray of food on the floor near the door. It looks like the exact same dinner Ignis made for Prompto, Gladio, and Noct tonight, and it hasn’t been touched.

“Hi, Marshal,” Prompto says.

No response. Prompto barrels on. “I promise I’m not here to gloat. I just wanted to know if there’s something I can do.”

Now Cor looks at him - totally blank-faced, the same expression that always had Prompto sweating during training. Even this many years later it makes him want to talk to fill the silence. “Sorry, I know, you can’t trust me. But this is bullshit. You shouldn’t - I can’t just watch you - fuck. This is all my fault.” He falls silent, and rests his head on the bars. “I didn’t want this. I’m sorry.”

Cor’s eyes flick over Prompto’s perfectly pressed uniform and his one hundred percent non-regulation hair. “Find Iris. Ask at the Voretooth’s Den.” And he turns back to staring at the wall. As effective of a dismissal as he can manage, and Prompto more than deserves it.

It takes Prompto a while to make himself leave. There’s got to be something else he can say, or something he can do to help. He wasn’t just trying to make Cor feel better - he really does take all the blame for this. If he hadn’t caught Cor, Cor wouldn’t be about to die for something Prompto really isn’t convinced is any kind of crime.

***

Noct’s got enough sympathy left in him that he doesn’t make the execution public. Or maybe that was Gladio’s idea; sometimes Gladio can work on Ignis until Ignis gets Noct to do whatever it is Gladio wanted in the first place. Sometimes he can’t. Noct usually doesn’t listen to Gladio about anything except training, these days. And he doesn’t listen to Prompto about much of anything at all.

Prompto would’ve told him he was being stupid, paranoid, throwing his weight around like a kid with a tantrum. Or maybe not. He’s never had to tell Noct that kind of thing. Noct’s not _like_ that. Sulky sometimes, and kind of a dick if he’s tired or stressed out, but no one ever worried that Noct was going to become a _tyrant_. Not until he came back and actually sat on the throne.

The execution is at dawn. Prompto runs every last Crownsguard ragged in a training session that lasts from an hour before sunrise to noon, and then gives them a half day of leave. They all knew Cor. This has got to be at least as rough on them as it is on Prompto. He catches more than one dirty look sent his way as they file out.

Yeah, better that Gladio doesn’t get to talk to any of them today. Instead, when Prompto catches Gladio on his way to the training grounds, he pulls a bottle of whiskey out of the armiger and says, “I got us the day off. Wanna come talk about it?”

Gladio grunts and walks past him, which isn’t a _no_ , so Prompto follows him to the Citadel gardens. Gladio throws himself on a bench and glares at a statue.

Prompto sits down next to him, pops the bottle, and takes a swig. Gladio doesn’t look at him as he takes the passed bottle. And he doesn’t immediately put it to his lips. Instead he pours out a generous measure of whiskey on the ground, closes his eyes, and takes a deep breath. _Then_ he drinks.

That’s about as much of a funeral as Cor is going to get, Prompto realizes. Noct probably had his body burned. No grave. No ceremony. Prompto didn’t get _more_ religious after he met the gods, but he says a little prayer anyway.

“It was quick,” Gladio says, after they’ve passed the bottle back and forth twice. “My sword, not magic. He asked for that.”

“I’m glad he didn’t suffer,” Prompto says.

Once upon a time, they wouldn’t’ve had to be so restrained about this. There was a time - Prompto remembers it, he swears - when Noct would’ve joined in a toast to Cor’s life.

He’s not sure when the shift happened exactly. Before the long night, Noct would never have ordered an execution at all. Three years ago, nah, he’s pretty sure Noct would’ve had more compassion, or at least listened to Ignis and Gladio when they told him not to do it. Two years ago? Last year? Prompto can’t put his finger on the moment things changed, but now, he and Gladio both know that they can’t even mourn Cor out loud.

“Gladio, have you seen - Prompto! There you are. Did you really let all the Crownsguard trainees off this afternoon?” Ignis walks quickly towards them, looking annoyed. Prompto gives him a wave.

“Not just the trainees, everybody. C’mon, Iggy, no one was going to be able to work today. Noct’ll be fine. Sit with us for a minute.”

Ignis adjusts his glasses so that the light flashes off them and Prompto can’t see his eyes at all. “The Marshal _was_ a traitor to the Crown.”

“So mourn that,” Prompto says. “He was still on Noct’s side for a lot longer than he wasn’t.”

Ignis doesn’t sit, but he does lean over the back of the bench between Prompto and Gladio. When Gladio passes him the whiskey, he drinks. “Noctis is communing with the Crystal,” he says.

Prompto shudders and takes the bottle Ignis proffers to him. The Crystal creeped him out before it vored his best friend and he doesn’t like it any more now that they have it back in chains at the Citadel. “Why? Didn’t he spend like two hours in there yesterday?”

“I asked, but he only told me not to worry about it. You know how he is.”

“Yeah. He won’t tell us until it’s a national security concern,” Gladio says, glaring at the ground. “I’m sure it’ll be _fine_.”

“He has his reasons,” Ignis says.

Gladio growls. “You say that a hell of a lot. I’m not so sure it’s his reasons at all.”

“Choose your words carefully, Gladio."

“Do you really trust that thing?” Gladio demands, then lowers his voice, glancing around. “I don’t. Iggy. He made me kill one of the best men I’ll ever know today. You can’t tell me that’s _him_ giving those orders.”

“We’re sworn to him no matter what,” Ignis says, his grip tightening on the neck of the bottle. Between the three of them, they’ve almost finished it; Prompto’s head is starting to spin.

“He’s right, though,” Prompto hears himself say. “Noct would never.”

Ignis frowns. “You’re both drunk,” he declares. “I shall let this slide. But I suggest you both go sleep it off.”

Prompto’s not _that_ drunk. But he recognizes Ignis’s words for the out that they are, and he nods, and he and Gladio lean on each other all the way back to their rooms.

***

The next morning, Prompto wakes up with a splitting headache and a resolution. He has to find Iris.

He wouldn’t be the first of them to go looking for her. She and Gladio aren’t in touch - she’s been working with Cor for years, and no one in that group wants to tell the Crownsguard any damn thing. Prompto can’t really blame them under the circumstances.

Luckily for him, unlike Gladio, Prompto’s pretty inconspicuous when he’s not in uniform. If he gels his hair back and dresses down he looks like any of the hundreds of other Niflheimir refugees who live on the outskirts of Insomnia. ( _Exactly_ like a few of them, even, which he tries not to think about too hard.) Noct barely tolerates them being there and Prompto’s pretty sure it’s only because of _him_ that they haven’t just been run out of the country yet. It’s a tough line to walk, staying on Noct’s good side.

It takes a couple of days, waiting for his chance, but eventually Noct declares that he’s not to be disturbed while he’s talking to the fucking magic rock and Prompto makes his move. He slips out a back door in the Citadel gardens, already dressed in his plainest clothes, and lets himself melt into the afternoon crowds of Insomnia. Taking his time, he ambles down the roads, making sure he doesn’t seem like he’s on too much of a mission. He’s got to be careful about this. Ten years of trying to survive together didn’t erase people’s prejudices, and Noct hasn’t helped with the way he talks about anywhere that isn’t Lucis.

So he keeps his head down and goes into a couple Niflheimer-owned shops, brushing up his Gralean accent, on his way to the bar Cor named. He knows the place. The Kingsglaive have raided it a couple of times. Prompto just hopes his disguise holds up well enough.

The entrance to the bar is easy to miss; there’s no name on it, just a sign in the shape of a voretooth’s face hanging over a door between two more popular restaurants. There’s no window. You kind of have to know it’s what you’re looking for.

Stepping off the street and into the bar is like stepping into another world. It’s cool and dark inside. There’s only a few people around, tucked into corner tables, and the light is low enough that Prompto can’t easily make out anyone’s face. They ignore him, and he tries to look inconspicuous as he steps up to the bar. He orders a beer and while he’s paying, he asks the bartender, “Do you know where I can find Iris Amicitia?”

The guy doesn’t even blink, just says, “Depends why you want to know.”

“Cor Leonis said I could meet her here.”

The bartender gives him a long look, and Prompto fidgets. That’s not part of his disguise but it does help. No one expects the soldiers of the Dawn King to get nerves.

It works. “Wait out back, kid. I’ll see what I can do.”

Prompto slips out the door the guy points at and into the alleyway behind the bar. Right now there’s more light here than inside, but he can tell that in the dark it’s the kind of place you get stabbed. Prompto leans against a wall and tries to concentrate on his beer instead of worrying about what he’s gonna say to Iris.

He’s finished with it and the alley is shading stab-wards by the time the door opens again. Prompto pops to his feet. “Iris?”

It’s been a while since Prompto worked with Iris. A couple of jobs when she was still learning back at the beginning of the long night, sure, but then their paths kind of diverged. She liked to be out on patrols, while Prompto stuck closer to home when he could, working on keeping the generators running and helping Iggy with logistics. Since the sun rose and she got mixed up with Cor, Prompto hasn’t seen her at all.

So he missed the bit where she turned _gorgeous_. His jaw nearly drops when he sees her peek out of the door. She’s filled out from last time he saw her, as muscled and tanned as Gladio, but with a lot more… curve to her. She’s wearing a jacket that looks like she stole it off Aranea, but she still likes short pleated skirts and tall boots. It’s a completely different effect than it used to be.

Luckily he gets his shit together after that first surprise. He needs her to want to talk to him ever again and he is _not_ going to be creepy about it. He had that lesson beaten into him in Lestallum, and he still dies a little inside whenever he thinks about how he used to talk to Cindy.

Her eyes narrow when she sees him and she shuts the door quick, her hand going to the holster on her thigh. _Knife_ , Prompto’s self-preservation instincts helpfully supply. He doesn’t exactly want to get into a shoot-out, so he lifts his hands and takes a couple steps back. “Iris! It’s okay, Cor sent me.”

“Before or after you dragged him in front of the King?” Iris asks. It hurts a little to hear her call him that. Iris _liked_ Noct.

“I didn’t know it’d end up like that. I wouldn’t’ve done it if I had.”

Iris lets go of her knife hilt then. She looks upset, and Prompto has to remind himself that she’s not a kid and would definitely not appreciate a hug right now. Besides, she’s doing better holding herself together than Prompto is. “Why did Cor send you?” she asks.

Prompto takes a deep breath. “I asked him what I could do to help.”

***

Iris shouldn’t trust him. She knows better than that; enough people she thought were good have gone the other way over the last few years that sometimes she thinks she just won’t trust anyone ever again.

It’s hard to maintain that level of cynicism looking at Prompto, though. She hasn’t seen him in a while. If she’d thought about it, she’d expect him to be looking better - in Insomnia at least, they’re starting to recover from the long night, and the King’s men ought to be the best fed and best taken care of out of all of them. But the shadows under Prompto’s eyes are even darker than they used to be.

“We need a contact in the Citadel,” she says, mostly to see what he’ll do. “After the Marshal got kicked out we’ve been in the dark.” It’s not entirely true; they have contacts in there. But Iris can’t risk blowing their cover. She doesn’t even want to imagine what Noctis might do if Prompto told him about informants in his inner circle.

Prompto winces, and… he really can’t keep his emotions off his face when he’s not smiling, can he? Iris never noticed that before. “What kind of contact?”

“We need to know what the King is planning. Where he’ll be sending his Guard. Who’s in danger, so we can get them out of it.”

“I can do that,” he says. The lack of hesitation takes her by surprise. If he was acting, he’d be better at it, wouldn’t he?

“Are you sure?” Iris asks. “You must know what it means to spy on the King. And you do _know_ what he’ll do if he catches on.” It took her a long time to come to grips with what _she_ was doing, going against Noctis’s decrees.

That makes Prompto stop and think, fidgeting with a strand of his hair. He doesn’t seem to want to catch her eye. “I know. I don’t want to fight him, or anything. But he’s gone too far. I feel like I have to do something to make up for it.”

He sounds sincere, and she can’t look a gift chocobo in the beak. She’ll just have to be prepared for him to get cold feet. “Alright. If we need you, someone will contact you - just be ready for it. You’re in all of his meetings, right?”

Prompto nods, the movement jerky. He really does look _just_ like one of the MT kids from Niflheim. Iris has never asked about it, but it’s clear he’s related to them. Especially with his hair down in the Niflheim style, he could be their older brother. “Most of them. I hear a lot. Noct…” he sighs heavily. “Noct trusts me.”

Iris nods. It’s good enough, for now. She shouldn’t be worrying about him; she has to assume he’s on Noctis’s side until proven otherwise. She wonders, if she tests him a little... “You have access to the armiger, right?" she asks. When he nods, she says, "I need two potions. Right now."

He doesn't even ask why, just grabs two glass bottles out of the air and hands them over.

Iris stares at them and then tucks them gently into her breast pocket. She hasn't used a potion since Cor got cut off from the armiger. Any curatives she gets her hands on go straight to Niflheim. It's... well, even if he does turn out to be loyal to Noctis, he's helped already.

"Thanks," she says. "I'll get in touch if I need you. The code word is 'moogle plush'."

Prompto smiles a little. "Well, at least I won't forget it. Right, okay." He runs his hand through his hair. "And for what it's worth, I really am sorry about Cor."

Iris thinks about asking him more about how it happened - if, like she's afraid of, her brother really did strike the killing blow - but decides she doesn't really want to hear it. "It's - yeah. I know."

***

Iris doesn’t trust him. That’s fair enough, under the circumstances. But hey, she didn’t kill him, and what she did tell him means he might be useful one of these days.

It’s not exactly what Prompto was hoping for - he’s not sure what he _was_ hoping for - but it makes things a little better. It eases some of the gnawing guilt that’s been growing since he brought Cor in front of Noct. And it makes it easier to put on a good face for the rest of them, when he goes back to the Citadel.

He slips back into his room the same way he snuck out, fluffs his hair back into shape and dresses in black again - pajamas this time. Then he curls up with his phone to play a couple rounds of King’s Knight with Noct.

It’s the only time Prompto feels like he _knows_ Noct anymore. They still work together as well as they ever did, leveling up their characters together while Noct sends Prompto two-word taunting messages and Prompto responds with strings of emoji.

Before long though, Noct falls asleep on him. It’s cute and Prompto sends him a bunch of _eye-rolls_ and then shuts off his phone.

After that the guilt settles in again, so intense that he can’t even tell who it’s for. Is he betraying Noct? Lucis? Cor? Everyone and everything at once? He should be loyal to his king - to his _best friend_. But he knows he can’t tell Noct about Iris, about whatever it is that Cor was mixed up in. It’ll just get more people killed. By his best friend.

He stews about it all night and when he gets up he heads straight to the canteen to suck down a gallon of the strong coffee that the Glaives make. It’s not exactly a substitute for sleep but it comes pretty close. He’s headed off to his office with his third cup when Ignis catches him in the hall.

“Prompto! Perhaps you’d walk with me. His Majesty wants an audience.” Ignis barely slows down.

“Yeah, ‘course,” Prompto says, and falls into step beside him.

The thing about working with Ignis is, Prompto _likes_ Ignis. Always has, even when Ignis was scary as hell because he was the responsible adult to Noct and Prompto’s dumbfuck kids. And nowadays Ignis smiles more than he used to. He’s friendly, almost _approachable_ , in a way he never was when they were younger. Noct coming back has been really good for him.

It’s just that Ignis is hell-bent on carrying out Noct’s orders, whatever they happen to be.

“Did he say what’s up?” Prompto asks, hoping to get some warning if there’s something crazy about to happen.

“He has a new assignment for you, since you did so well with Marshal Leonis. I’ll let him explain.” Ignis looks at Prompto sideways, then frowns. “You look tired.”

Prompto shrugs. “I didn’t sleep much,” he says.

“You and Noctis were up late again, weren’t you?” Ignis says, shaking his head.

“Yeah, maybe a bit.” Prompto grins. That’s a good excuse and it’s even partway true. “We’re about to hit level 85 again.”

Ignis tuts, but he looks pleased, which is kind of weird. “I suppose I can’t fault you. Noctis can certainly use the distraction, with as much as we have to do lately.”

In his office, Noct is standing bent over his desk, supporting most of his weight on his hands. His back’s been giving him trouble lately. More than usual. Noct doesn’t like to talk about it, but all of them know when he’s in pain. The worse it gets, the more time he spends with the Crystal.

He looks up when Prompto and Ignis come in and smiles. He looks about as tired as Prompto feels. “Thanks for finding him, Specs,” he says. “Hey Prompto, come over here.”

Prompto comes around the table and looks where Noct points. It’s a military map, and Prompto recognizes that topography - but what the hell could Noct want there? “What am I looking at?” he asks, hoping he sounds game for it.

“It’s the Niflheim outlands,” Noct says, like Prompto can’t tell. He touches the edge of the map, and ice crystals spread over it, the mountains rising up out of the desk in miniature. As always, Prompto gets the shivers when Noct shows off like that. “We’ve heard rumors that the Nifs are bringing Immortalis back up. You’re the one who took it down last time, think you can do it again?”

Noct - the _real_ Noct, the Noct Prompto remembers - would never, ever ask Prompto to do that. Prompto stares at him as he tries to get a handle on his fight-or-flight response. “You want me to go _back there?_ ”

Whatever Noct sees on Prompto’s face, at least he has the sense to look sheepish about it. “I thought… y’know, maybe it’d help. Facing up to it again.”

It _won’t_ , Prompto wants to scream. There’s nothing about that part of his life that he ever wants to revisit, and just the idea of being inside one of those magitek facilities again has him wanting to shoot someone and throw up and hide under his bed all at once.

But Noct doesn’t take contradiction, anymore, and Prompto’s not brave enough to try. He nods, instead. “Yeah. You’re - you’re probably right. Thanks, Noct.”

Noct smiles at him. He almost looks like himself again. “Great. I have to thank you, too. This is going to be so important.”

Prompto listens to all Noct’s plans for Immortalis with a mask of polite excitement frozen on his face. It’s going to be so good for Insomnia, he says. Really help defend the borders. Be a major blow to Niflheim’s confidence.

Prompto doesn’t know what world Noct’s living in that Niflheim still gives any fucks about conquering Lucis, but he nods anyway, accepts the dossier Ignis hands him, bows on his way out the door. What else is he going to do?

***

Iris hears the rumors from her contacts a few days after she meets with Prompto. First it’s vague - “a strike on Niflheim” is something she hears an awful lot - but for once, this one resolves into something more clear. They’re restoring some hideous war machine out in the snows in Niflheim’s borderlands. And King Noctis is after it.

“I wonder what it's like to pilot that thing,” Laguna says wistfully, looking at the grainy snapshot of the giant metal monster that’s apparently meant to conquer countries.

“You have to turn into a daemon first," Kiros points out. Ward signs something to him - Iris hasn't quite learned enough sign language yet to figure out what, but Kiros snickers, and Laguna looks offended and launches into an argument in his own defense.

Iris, who can’t imagine looking at any tech of Niflheim’s and wanting to do anything but lop its head off, frowns at the knife she’s sharpening. She doesn’t know what they’re going to do about the situation. If Cor were here, he’d have them organized by now, ready to infiltrate the Lucian mission or bribe their way into Niflheim, or… something. He’d be sure that they were on track to ensure the King never got anywhere near that weapon.

Iris slips her knife back into its holster. “Are we going to go get that thing, or not?” she asks the room in general.

Kiros looks at her and raises an eyebrow. “Isn’t that up to you?”

Ward and Laguna are looking at her, too, and even Imber has paused in his examination of his gunblade. Well… damn. Is she in charge? She told Cor she’d watch his back, and she failed. She didn’t think that meant she’d have to take up his mantel.

“I guess we better,” she says.

***

Prompto hears from Iris two days before he’s set to go out to Niflheim. Well, not from Iris directly - she sends someone Prompto’s never seen before, an angry-looking guy with a scar across his nose.

When the guy stops him in the street, looking him up and down, Prompto’s pretty sure they’re about to get into a fight. But he just says “moogle plush” in a tone basically exactly the same as Noct saying “beans” and Prompto ends up laughing as he pulls the guy into an alley to chat quietly.

“What’s up?” he asks. “I guess we, uh, have a mutual friend, huh?”

The guy stares at him for a very _long_ second, and then nods. “She wants to know what you know about the Immortalis mission.”

Oh, damn. That makes sense. That makes _so_ much sense - and all of a sudden, it becomes real for Prompto. He’s not just helping Iris in memory of Cor. He’s - what does Ignis call it - aiding and abetting enemies of the Crown.

“What’s she going to do with it?” Prompto’s hedging for time and the guy seems to know it.

“Are you on her side, or not?” the guy asks. It’s a fair question. Prompto really _hopes_ he knows the right answer.

“…I am. But. We’ve gotta go somewhere safe. You know a place?” Prompto asks. He knows himself well enough; he can keep a secret, but once he starts talking about it he _will_ give the kind of details that would get him… in trouble if word of him spilling them ever got back to Noct.

“Yeah. Take that jacket off. You’ll get jumped.”

Prompto glances down at his Glaive coat. Fair point. He ditches the jacket. The tank top he’s wearing under it does show off his barcode, but he isn’t the only blond guy walking around with a barcode on his wrist these days. It’s fine.

Scarface leads Prompto along some side streets Prompto would never have gone down himself, and into a little cafe. There’s some guys playing cards at a table in the corner. Scarface takes the table right next to them. Prompto just hopes to high heaven they aren’t anybody’s double-agent.

“We’re good here?” he asks. Scarface nods. Prompto takes a deep breath. No going back if he tells them about this, but… maybe that’s for the best. “I’m in charge of the mission,” he says.

Scarface doesn’t blink or react. Not that Prompto expected him to, exactly? But the blank stare and his own nerves kind of make him want to keep talking. “We’re leaving in two weeks. I’m taking a team of five Glaives. All loyal to the Crown as far as I know. Not Gladio or Ignis, though.”

“He doesn’t send you out together anymore,” Scarface says. Which Prompto hadn’t thought about it, but his heart sinks as he realizes it’s true. Since they started trying to catch Cor, Noct hasn’t deliberately let Prompto go out with Gladio _or_ Ignis for any missions or anything. They still hang out in the Citadel, but they never leave its grounds together.

“Guess he’s got enough places for us all to be.” Prompto feels guilt twist his gut as he says it. He knows why he and Iggy and Gladio have been stretched so thin; they’re the only ones that Noct really trusts. And here’s Prompto betraying him.

Scarface has no time for Prompto’s second thoughts. “Tell me what you know about the Glaives coming with you.”

At this point, it’s kind of easier to tell him than not. Prompto goes over the names. He knows their fighting styles, and he knows that they’re all loyal to the King, though maybe not to Noct personally. It’s just that Insomnia was once upon a time the only place that would help them fight the people who destroyed their lands

Prompto really hopes this doesn’t mean he’s going to have to fight them.

Scarface doesn’t take notes or anything, but Prompto gets the feeling that he’s going to repeat everything word for word back to Iris. He hopes it’s helpful, in whatever it is they’re doing.

“If you see anyone from our group while you’re there, ignore them. They’ll give you the code word if they need to. And don’t change your strategy.”

“Are you sure? Isn’t there anything I can do to help you?” Prompto asks.

“No. We’ll take it from here.” Gods, this guy is _terrifying_. He hasn’t even changed expression but he’s got, like, resting scary face. If they’d met in literally any other circumstances Prompto would be doing backflips to try and get the guy to smile. “Remember that if you let on about this to the King, people will die.”

“I won’t,” Prompto says. Hearing it laid out like that makes it feel way worse. It shouldn’t be true; being out of Noct’s favor shouldn’t be a death sentence. But this is what they’ve come to. This is why Prompto’s here.

The guy looks him over and nods again, then stands up and walks right out, leaving Prompto alone.

***

The five Glaives on Prompto’s team aren’t exactly his friends. All of them are Galahdian, and while the Galahdians don’t keep to themselves as much as the Niflheimers do, they don’t go out of their way to be friendly to Lucian natives. At least not lately. Prompto’s fought and trained with all of them, but he doesn’t hang out with them outside of missions.

They leave at dawn on a Monday, and the airship hums steadily along for that whole day and into Tuesday. The six of them trade off shifts at the controls, even Prompto, who outranks the rest of them and could just play games on his phone the whole way if he wanted. He doesn’t. He’d rather let his people see him working with them.

It’s a long trip, but with any luck, the mission itself won’t take more than a few hours. In, disable Immortalis, pick the giant monster robot remains of Prompto’s dad up with their stolen Niflheimir tractor beam, destroy the facility, out, done. Prompto’s looking forward to the ‘destroy the facility’ part, at least.

“Commander?” Luxas says from the control seat.

Prompto lifts himself up from where he’s been dozing on a bench. “Yeah, what’s up?”

“We’re above the facility now.”

Prompto glances at the windows. Still dark, not ideal, but it should be light in a few hours. “Take us down as close as you can. We’ll wait until the sun comes up to head in. The fewer daemons we have to deal with, the better.”

“Yes, sir.” Luxas taps the controls and the ship glides down in a slow circle, headed for the snowbanks a few miles away from the Magitek Facility. The rest of the Glaives - Dagger, Rupe, Sera, and Vivus - pull themselves to their feet and start checking over their equipment.

Prompto wonders how Iris and her team got here. As far as he knows they don’t have any airships or helicopters. But getting out this far over land is an absolute pain in the ass. He hopes they’re here by now, however they did it. It’s not like he’s going to be able to stall.

Their reports on what’s going on inside the facility are sketchy as hell. Prompto runs the Glaives through what little they know as they wait. It’s probably the tenth time they’ve gone over it, but it sort of calms them all down. The place has been abandoned since before the long night; it’s probably full of daemons; the human presence has to be minimal since there’s been little activity traveling to it; there’s likely to be crazy experiments that they’ll get to fight.

Prompto doesn’t talk about the clones. As far as he knows, they’ve all either escaped or died. But he does tell them about Besithia’s experimental daemon-animal hybrid, which seems to give them enough of a scare.

At dawn, they file out of the ship and into the snow, headed for the nearest doors. Prompto’s heart is racing, but his hands are steady on his gun. Astrals only know what’s waiting for them in there.

The facility is more decrepit than Prompto remembers. Fair enough. He did sort of trash a lot of it, and no one was trying to make more MTs during the long night. As far as he can tell, from the outside, it’s deserted. No sign of whatever optimistic Niflheimer has been trying to bring Besithia’s experiments back to life.

The big front doors are locked, but that doesn’t pose much of a problem. Rupe just pulls out his greatsword and punches right through the glass. Niflheim’s tech is pretty good, but it’s not up to the task of stopping Lucian training and magic.

Prompto steps inside first, gun raised. Despite their loud entrance, they don’t seem to have gotten any attention. The hallways look empty, but as they walk slowly through them, Prompto keeps hearing things shuffling in the shadows.

“That’s gotta be daemons,” Luxas says. Luxas is one of the younger Glaives, barely twenty, and these kids who grew up in the dark are practically psychic when it comes to picking up on daemon activity. They had to be.

“Stay on alert,” Prompto says unnecessarily. “But don’t go hunting. We don’t want to catch their attention if we can help it.” If Iris is around, Prompto doesn’t want any of her team getting caught by his. Last thing they need is a firefight.

The Glaives follow Prompto’s lead deeper into the facility. Between the state he was in when he was first here and the nearly fifteen years since, he can’t imagine he actually knows better than anyone else where to go, but he’s in charge. Great.

They hear more shuffling and knocking around, but they never _see_ anything. No daemons or animals jump out to fight them. Prompto would almost rather that they did. At least a fight would let off some of the tension that keeps ratcheting up.

The silence is broken by a mechanical shriek that seems to come from everywhere at once. All of them jump into defensive formations. Prompto ends up with his back to Luxas and Dagger, all three of them with guns out, looking around for the source of the noise. A mechanical grinding starts up and the ground shakes underneath them like an earthquake.

Dagger curses and Luxas picks his head up, nodding to Prompto’s left. “I think it’s coming from that way.”

Another shriek, another rattle of the metal floor under their feet, and this time Prompto can hear it too. “Long range weapons, everyone. If something’s out there we don’t want it to get on top of us.”

He swaps his pistol for the machine gun from the armiger, and the Glaives who have crossbows and rail guns do the same. Prompto nods in approval. “Stay calm and remember what I told you. Aim for the eyes. Rupe and Vivus, stay on alert and watch our backs. We don’t know what else is here.”

A chorus of, “Yes, sir!” follows, and Prompto sees his lines shuffle. They let him take point, like they talked about. He’s the only one who’s seen anything like this before. As soon as they’re armed he leads them in the direction of the noise.

“Do they know we’re here?” Luxas asks.

“If the CCTV still works at all. It’s everywhere in here.”

But it’s not humans - or Immortalis - who find them first. Prompto hears crashing footsteps and swings around to face off with the creature running towards them down a hall. It’s not a daemon, or at least, not all a daemon. One of Besithia’s experiments, it’s gotta be. Prompto barely has time to aim before he shoots.

The panther-like _thing_ growls and falls back only to launch itself at them again. Prompto hurries to shoot again. This time his shot is backed up by three more, the Glaives behind him recovered from their shock and ready to go. The creature is bleeding, blood and miasma both, but it doesn’t back down. It leaps over Prompto and gets in the middle of them, slashing and biting wildly all around.

Prompto turns to aim at it again, but a growl from behind him catches his attention first. Another one of the things is coming down the hall, and next to it something like a gorilla, making his skin crawl with the memories. “Luxas, Rupe, with me!” he calls out. The two Glaives turn away and get into formation with him. They look terrified and Prompto doesn’t blame them.

The gorilla launches itself at them and suddenly Prompto’s fighting for his life, harder than he has in years. He shoots and swaps guns and throws magic flasks around like it’s going out of style, and the monsters don’t seem to care. One of the panthers falls but still swipes at anyone who gets too close to it.

Prompto sees when it happens but he can’t do anything to stop it. Dagger has her sword up against the gorilla, and the downed panther reaches out and grabs her ankle, pulling her off balance and giving the other monster a chance to grab her and throw her against the wall. She lands with her neck twisted. Already dead.

Luxas screams and lunges at the gorilla. He shoots it dead - railgun bolt between the eyes - but the damage is done. Vivus throws phoenix down at Dagger’s body and nothing happens. And Prompto can’t even stop to try anything else, because there are two more not-animals coming down the hallway towards them, ready to take more of them out.

Prompto’s pretty sure they’re _all_ dead. Luxas is practically berserk, Rupe is dragging with injury, Vivus is panicking, and though Prompto himself is doing all he can to keep them going, they’re losing.

And then suddenly they’re not. One of the monsters falls, its head cleanly separated from its shoulders. And then, like a fucking blessing from Ramuh, Iris is at his back with a sword as tall as she is.

“You made it,” Prompto says in disbelief.

“‘Course we did.” Iris grins like a wolf. “Let me take care of these guys.”

Prompto’s never seen Iris “Daemonslayer” Amicitia at work before. Sure, he’s heard her name thrown around. He knows her reputation. But he never expected this. She’s like _art_.

She wields the giant sword like it’s nothing, leaping almost like she’s warping onto a panther’s back and burying her blade in its spine. Even as it dies she’s looking for her next target. “Prompto, get the tiger over here!” she calls out.

Prompto shoots the thing to get its attention and then again, twice, to make it flinch off towards her. She jumps off the panther’s body and uses the momentum to slice deep into the tiger’s flank, making its back legs collapse. Prompto’s able to finish it off with another shot to the eye.

And then it’s quiet. Prompto looks around wildly, first checking for more monsters and then for his team. “Glaives, report!” he calls out.

Luxas, Sera, and Vivus sound off, though Vivus sounds strained. Prompto gives him a potion - he’s running low on those - before he goes to look at the damage.

Dagger still lies where she was thrown, her neck twisted at a sick angle. Rupe is down with his throat sliced open as neatly as a knife wound. Prompto hates this part a lot. “Sorry,” he says, kind of stupidly. Not like they can hear him. Luxas, kneeling over Dagger’s body, makes a muffled, angry noise.

“You’d better take care of the bodies,” Iris says. She’s come up behind him, and she touches his shoulder gently.

Prompto nods. “Luxas, get her dog tags if you want them. Then get out of the way,” he says. Luxas does as ordered. Prompto pulls two fire flasks out of the armiger and cracks one over Dagger’s body, then one over Rupe’s. The flames will consume everything that a daemon might come out of.

When Prompto looks up from the magical flames, Iris has company. The guy with the scar on his face, he recognizes, but the guy with the Galahdian-looking braids and the guy with the long black hair, he doesn’t. Prompto’s Glaives gather up behind him and face off with Iris’s crew.

“So, lucky we ran into you,” Prompto says, hoping she lets him get away with the lie. He doesn’t want the Glaives to know what’s up. He doubts they’ll let it slide. “Thanks.”

“I’m just sorry we didn’t get here earlier,” Iris says. “I didn’t realize there was anyone else here.”

“I think they would’ve taken all of us out if you hadn’t shown up, so, I’m glad you did,” Prompto says.

“What are you doing here?” Luxas asks, when Prompto stops talking. It’s kind of out of protocol but Prompto will let it slide.

“We’re hunting,” the black-haired guy says with a smile before anyone else can answer. “Do you know what these things’ teeth go for? Neither do I off the top of my head, but it’s a lot.” He walks over to one of the leopard things and shoves at it with his foot until its head falls back and its jaw opens. “I’m Laguna. This is Kiros and Imber, and you know Iris.”

“Uh, yeah. Hi.” Prompto introduces himself and each Glaive in turn. They look shell-shocked; Prompto figures he probably isn’t much better off. It’s not that he’s not used to losing people, but he wasn’t expecting to do it like that. Not today.

“We’re here on Crown business,” Prompto says, so he doesn’t have to try and spin out anything complicated. “Thanks for the hand. You guys can keep the bodies. Just make sure to burn them after you’re done getting trophies. You can pretty much assume everything in here is scourge-infected.”

“That’s the plan,” Laguna says. He’s pulling teeth out of the leopard’s mouth. Prompto wonders if they really are valuable, or if that’s just a cover.

“Can we follow along with you?” Iris asks. “We’ve already lost one person in here, and without him we don’t have an access code.”

That means the one they lost was another clone. Prompto always gets the creeps when he hears that one of them died. “If you don’t get in the way,” he says, eventually. “Stay back and take out monsters for us and it’s fine.”

Iris smiles brightly. “That’s what we do,” she says.

“Great. We’re headed deeper in. Should be plenty more where that came from. Glaives, we’ll take point, let’s go.” Prompto shoulders his gun and starts walking down the hall. His team hurry to follow him, and Iris comes along a few paces back, followed by Imber. Laguna and Kiros stay behind to handle the remaining bodies.

“Commander, shouldn’t we be bringing her in?” Sera asks him in an undertone. Now that the stampede of monsters has ended, it’s mostly quiet again except for their footsteps. Lucky that Prompto doesn’t care if Iris and Imber can hear them. “She was mixed up with the Marshal.”

“Let’s keep ourselves focused on the mission,” Prompto says. “We can worry about her after we get Immortalis.”

It doesn’t exactly make Sera happy, but she falls back to position again next to Vivus. On her other side, Luxas walks along with a completely blank expression. At a guess, Prompto would say that he and Dagger were closer than they’d let on. Couples aren’t supposed to go on missions together for _exactly_ this reason. ‘Course, Prompto was supposed to be keeping them all safe, and he’s already let two of them die.

And now that Iris is here, they’re not even going to gain anything from it. No way will she let him drag Immortalis back to Insomnia for Noct to use gods know how. Prompto’s not sure if it’s worse, or better, that Dagger and Rupe died for nothing than if they’d died bringing Noct his siege weapon.

Somewhere far off in the facility, something clicks and then crashes. All of them freeze, weapons drawn. The next thing they hear is a low, almost mechanical growling.

“More of those tiger things?” Sera asks.

“Could be,” Imber says. He has some kind of crazy sword with a trigger on it, and right now he’s holding it like a really long pistol, aiming it down hallways as they pass them.

“I don’t want to end up in another fight like that,” Iris says. “I’m not sure how many of those I can take.”

Prompto shudders. “Wish I knew how many there were. There was only one the last time I came through. How did they even survive this long?”

Imber shrugs with one shoulder, still looking down the next hallway before he lets them walk past it. “Daemons don’t die until you kill them.”

“Yeah.” Prompto falls silent. For a while, the only sound is their footsteps echoing off the metal walls. Then the grinding noise starts up again, making all Prompto’s hair stand on end. They all walk a little more carefully as they approach the main control room.

“I’ll check out the computers,” Prompto says, running a thumb over his barcode. “See if I can figure out where we’re going. Glaives, watch the hall.” The Glaives salute quickly and stick by the door while Prompto walks inside. Iris and Imber follow him.

“Commander, do you need backup?” Sera asks. She’s frowning at Iris; Iris tilts her head, looking confused, and completely innocent.

“It’s fine, Sera. Guard our six. You’ve seen what those things can do,” Prompto adds as confidently as he can, when she looks skeptical.

She goes. None of the Glaive look happy about it, but at least Prompto and Iris are alone. Maybe he can figure out what he should be doing.

It takes three tries to find a computer that will turn on, but that computer accepts Prompto’s barcode as a passcode instantly. He will never understand why that works. Maybe because they never thought a clone could have enough of a mind of its own to bother hacking the system? The thought makes his skin crawl, so he tries to avoid it.

The map of the facility that he pulls up is full of red. Doors open that shouldn’t be, electric lines that have failed, computers and cameras that aren’t responding. What’s not red is blank nothingness. There are little white and blue life signs, but not many - Kiros and Laguna in the hallway they just left, a few smatterings of what’s got to be more monsters, and then, in the top left corner, a really, really big blob of white.

“There haven’t been any _people_ in here in forever,” Prompto says, chewing on his lip. “No way is anybody living like this. It’s just the experiments.”

“And Immortalis?” Iris asks.

Prompto frowns at the screen and taps on the white blob. “Right there,” he says. “Storage hangar.”

“Our plan was to get to it and trigger its self-destruct,” Iris tells him. “Niflheim always builds one in. It was about the best we could do with what we had. We had Velox log into the system, but he opened the doors to the monster cages instead of the hangar.”

“So that’s when those things got loose,” Prompto says. He glances over at the Glaives. Luxas and Vivus are watching the hall, but Sera has one eye on Iris and Imber.

Imber nods. “We lost Velox in the first rush and Immortalis is active now.”

Prompto curses. That’s about the worst way that could have gone. “Okay, so what’s the plan?”

“We have no idea,” Iris says. She glances back at the Glaives again. Prompto taps some random menu-looking icons just to look like he’s doing something.

“The airship,” Prompto says after a minute, too loud.

Iris hushes him and moves in closer. “The one you came in?”

“Yeah. If I can get back to it, and I can get to Immortalis, I can use the tractor beams. I don’t know if it’ll pin it while it’s active but I bet it’ll slow it down enough to find the self-destruct.”

“That’s a plan,” Imber says. “If you can hold it, I’ll find a way to destroy it.”

“Good.” Prompto leans forward on the desk, frowning at the computer screen. It isn’t telling him anything even slightly useful, like where the hell the access to the hangar is. “I’m gonna need it to be at the top level of the facility, at least. Otherwise those magnets aren’t gonna catch anything but the walls.”

“I’ll take Laguna and we’ll draw it up here for you,” Iris says.

“Perfect. Thanks, guys. Okay, let’s -”

The sound of fighting breaking out cuts Prompto off in the middle of his thought. He draws his machine gun, expecting more of those hybrid horrors - but instead he hears gunshots and human voices yelling as he gets to the doors of the control room.

The first thing he sees, when he looks through the door, is Sera on her ass up against the wall with her gun drawn. Following her aim, he sees Laguna aiming right back at her. Luxas is sprawled out on the ground, and Kiros has Vivus on his knees, clapping handcuffs on him.

“What the hell?” Prompto asks, dumbly. His first instinct is to fire at Laguna, but Laguna’s one of Iris’s. He can’t. He freezes, finger on the trigger.

In the pause, Sera gets to her feet, leaning against the wall. She takes in Prompto's hesitation, and Iris behind him, and her jaw drops open. “You’re working with her, aren’t you, Commander? How _could_ you?"

It’s a question that Prompto’s been asking himself too much. His fingers feel heavy.

Iris comes to his rescue. “He knows his loyalty is to Lucis,” she says. “You don’t have to fight us. You can work with us too -”

Sera isn’t interested in listening to her. Her gun comes up to shoot at Iris, but Prompto’s faster.

His aim is good. The bullet hits her right between the eyes and she drops like her strings have been cut. Somebody yells, but Prompto doesn’t know who. When Prompto puts his gun away, Iris is staring at him with wide eyes.

There’s not exactly time to talk about it. The floor shakes violently again. Prompto rushes back to the computer screen to confirm what he already knows. “Immortalis is on the move!”

“Get out of here,” Iris tells him. “Get to the airship. You’re right, that’s our only shot.”

Prompto looks at the maps. There's two doors between Immortalis and the outside, and he points them out to Iris. "Give me five minutes and then open these. And then run like hell. I might hurt you getting that thing out."

Iris grabs the back of his hand. She gives his wrist a quick squeeze, and then pulls him away from the computers. “I’ll take care of it. Take this and _go._ ” She shoves a two-way radio into his hand.

Prompto doesn’t want to leave her, or leave what’s left of his team alone with her, but she’s right. They've got to do this before Immortalis breaks its way out. He’ll just have to trust her. “Be careful,” he says, and bolts for the entrance.

The rattling of Immortalis throwing itself at the walls is almost constant now, and he hears the screeching of metal against metal. Prompto wonders how long the place will hold, and tries to run _faster_.

When he bursts out through the wreckage of the front doors, the groaning of the walls gives way to the constant, grating whine of the wind. The sun is still out but it’s going down, and it’s so cold that Prompto’s fingers are numb within minutes.

It’s the worst time he’s ever made, for sure, but he slogs through the snow like everybody’s life depends on it. If Immortalis gets out of the facility, they’re probably all dead. He wishes he knew that Iris was okay. But he’s her best chance right now.

The wind stops and he blinks, looking up at the hulking form of the airship. He’s almost _made_ it. He hauls himself up the ladder into the airship’s control room and forces his frozen fingers to start up the controls. He can do this. He knows he can. Still, he feels an enormous wave of relief when the ship finally lifts off.

He steers directly over the facility this time. Below him through the glass of the windscreen he can see the facility shake and buckle as Immortalis throws itself against the walls. The door to its hangar should be opening if Iris managed to get there. With any luck Immortalis will head straight out. Then Prompto can grab it without any trouble.

Maybe Noct was a little right. Prompto’s fingers dance on the controls, just itching to hook the beams into Immortalis’s metal shell. This time, he’s going to _get_ the fucking thing.

He hovers over the facility for seconds, then minutes. Something’s wrong. They should’ve been out here by now. The metal walls are shaking harder and even from up here, Prompto can hear something crashing around. Shit. What the hell is going on in there?

It takes him three tries to get through to Iris on the radio. When her voice finally crackles through - “Prompto!” - he breathes a sigh of relief.

“What’s going on in there?” he asks.

“It’s not going for the doors,” Iris replies. Even over the bad connection, she sounds scared. “It’s coming through the walls at us.”

“It knows you’re there?”

“It must,” Iris pants. “It keeps following us. Are you in position? Can you grab it?”

“Not through the roof.” Prompto taps his fingers on the control panels. “I just had a really dumb idea. How fast can you guys get out of there?”

“We’re almost out. Two minutes. Laguna's injured.”

“Move as fast as you can. Soon as I see you come out the doors I’m gonna take that thing down for good this time.”

It’s a tense few minutes, watching the doors, before he sees a small black-clad figure burst out into the snow. It’s followed by two more, and then a fourth, struggling. The first figure waves its arms at him and then Prompto’s radio crackles again. “That’s all of us!”

It’s not. Prompto left six of them. But he aims the ship straight at the facility, opens the hatch, and cuts the engines.

As the airship goes into free-fall, he runs for the hatch, building speed. At the very last possible second he _jumps_ as hard as he can, throwing himself away from the ship and into a forward roll. The noise of the airship crashing drowns out everything. Prompto hits the ground, hard, feet-first but then rolling forward until the snow takes the momentum out of him.

He lies on his back, staring up at the sun and hurting. He doesn’t think he broke any ribs or anything major, but he can tell from the pain in his ankle that it’s sprained at _least._ After the fighting earlier today all he’s got is a handful of elixirs, which he’d better save for something worse than this. Fuck it. Doesn’t matter. He needs to get to Iris. He makes himself stand up and, though his head spins, his ankle holds him up.

On his unsteady way back towards the wreckage, he runs into Kiros. He offers Prompto an arm to lean on, and a bottle of something that’s not a potion but still takes some of the ache out of Prompto’s body. Prompto could kiss him if he weren’t so damn tired. Instead he just puts one foot in front of the other foot until his ankle stops whining at him and he can walk on his own again.

Kiros leads him back towards the facility. They’re nearly inside the blast radius when they come across the others. Laguna is sitting propped up against the tipped-over body of a truck, his face white; Vivus sits on the ground next to him with his hands still tied behind his back. Iris stands over him. A big guy Prompto hasn’t met before kneels next to Laguna, holding a folded towel against his leg.

“You found him!” Iris says. She sounds surprised.

Kiros nods. “I saw him leave the airship. That was a dumb stunt,” he tells Prompto point-blank. “You’re lucky you didn’t get yourself killed too.”

Prompto shakes his head, which kind of hurts, so he stops. “What happened to Luxas? And Imber,” he adds. There should be more of them.

“Luxas came to and tried to run,” Iris says. “There was a fight. The two of them didn’t make it out.”

 _Shit_. All but one of the Glaives Prompto was trusted with, dead. He doesn’t want to believe it. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” Laguna puts in. “Sorry to have to tell you. But they’re gone.” He tries to stand up and winces.

Iris shakes her head at him. “Let Kiros look at you,” she says. Laguna nods and Kiros goes over to check out what looks like a nasty gash in his upper thigh.

Vivus watches them. He isn’t fighting the ties, Prompto notes, but he does glare up at Prompto when he sees him watching. “Was this part of the plan, Commander?” he asks.

“Not exactly,” Prompto admits. “Are you gonna give us trouble?”

It takes Vivus a while to answer, and Prompto spends it wondering what he’s going to do if Vivus says _yes_. He doesn’t think he has it in him to kill a Glaive in cold blood, but keeping someone around who might give them up to Noct…

Luckily, Vivus shakes his head. “No. You're trying to get rid of the King, right? I'm with you."

Prompto looks to Iris, who bites her lip. "That's good enough for me," she says. "We can figure the rest of it out later. We have to figure out how to get back to civilization first."

“What was the plan for that?” Prompto asks.

“Hitch a ride with you,” Iris replies with a wry smile and a shrug.

"Aranea dropped us off, so she's gotta be out here somewhere," Laguna says. "She'll take us if you give her enough elixirs."

“Aranea?” Prompto asks. So she _is_ working with them. They’d suspected, but hadn’t been sure - and Prompto catches Iris frowning at Laguna like she knows he just gave away one of their secrets. But Prompto’s stuck on Aranea wanting something other than money. “What would she need those for?”

Iris sighs, then shrugs. “They still have to use them on the fields, the way we did the last few years of the long night, remember? Nothing grows here at all anymore otherwise.”

“They still have the Glacian’s winter,” Prompto says. He remembers traveling through the parts of Niflheim where only the hardiest plants and animals could’ve survived even before the night fell. Back then they used magitek to grow crops, but that didn’t work without any sunlight at all, so they’d turned to the Lucian magic.

“Yeah. We’ve been keeping them going for a while, but without Cor it’s pretty hard to get hold of the curatives.”

“ _That’s_ what all that was about,” Prompto says. “No wonder Noct was - I mean - damn.” The mere mention of Noct’s name has all of them glaring at him. He shakes his head. “I’ll give her what I’ve got.”

“Niflheim is fairly hard up. She’d give us transport for a potion at this point,” Kiros says. “Though she’ll make you think she’s going to leave you in the mountains first.”

“Aw, you just have to know how to talk to the lady,” Laguna says.

“I’m not sure how long it will take to get hold of her,” Iris says. “I’ll go to our regular meet up point, but that’s a day and a half of hiking from here. You guys should get away from the facility and make camp.”

Kiros frowns. “That’s a long trip to make on your own.”

“And no way are you going without backup,” Prompto says. “I’ll come with. I have the elixirs, anyway. Just let me… confirm I got the target, first.”

“You did,” Vivus tells him. “There’s nothing left of it. …Good riddance,” he adds after a pause.

He turns out to be right. The facility is a ruin. If they can even get inside, Prompto doubts they’ll find anything useful. It would take days to do a real search, and if Prompto leaves it that long it’ll be impossible for him to convince Noct that he wasn’t doing anything nefarious out here.

What a depressing fucking thought.

Prompto’s staring at the wreckage when Iris comes up beside him. “We’d better get going,” she says.

Prompto doesn’t move. “I wanted to get their dog tags, anyway. It would be something.”

“You’ll be able to tell their families they died in service to the Crown. It’ll be enough,” Iris says. She sounds a bit wistful.

Prompto nods, and she leads him back to where the other guys are sitting, to grab some trail snacks for the road and say her goodbyes. Prompto hopes they’ll be okay. Laguna seems pretty cheerful about camping out in the snow, but the rest of them aren't happy, and Prompto doesn't blame them.

Iris leads the way in silence for a while. Prompto tries to make light conversation, mostly to distract himself, but she doesn't really pick up any threads, until he says something like: _sorry I got everyone into this mess_.

She doesn’t turn around, focused on the trail ahead of her, but she _sounds_ like she’s frowning. “No. You saved our lives, you know that? And maybe a lot more, keeping that thing away from Insomnia.”

"You were only there because of me."

“The King could’ve sent Ignis, or my brother, and… maybe we wouldn’t have achieved our goals. Maybe more of us would’ve died.”

It didn’t go well at all, but Prompto can imagine a hundred ways it could have gone _worse._ “No way would Gladio have let you die.” He doesn’t protest about Ignis, though.

Iris just shrugs. “Maybe not me.”

There’s that. Prompto wishes he could reassure her, but he just doesn’t know anymore.

Iris says the cabin is only a few miles away, but they don’t have quite enough daylight to get them all the way there. The temperature drops from cold to frigid as the sun disappears. Prompto is about ready to start praying when he finally sees the shadow of the cabin against the snow.

“Made it!” he says, as cheerfully as he can manage, and puts on a burst of speed so he can get the door for Iris. She smiles and shakes her head at him, but walks in first.

“Cozy, right?” she says. Maybe a _little_ sarcastic.

Cozy is one word, Prompto thinks. It’s just like every other hunters’ cabin he’s ever been in - just enough space inside for a single bed at one end, a propane stove on the other, and a table with one chair in between. There’s no windows and the battery-powered lamp is too harsh and not enough light at the same time. But it’s already warming up inside as they drop their packs, so Prompto’s not going to diss it.

“Oh, there’s tea,” Iris says, looking in the cabinet by the stove. “And a first aid kit. I think there’s even a potion in here… are you sure your ankle is alright?”

Prompto’s not, actually. The ankle he twisted doesn’t hurt, but sometimes the way his biology reacts to stuff, that doesn’t mean much. As long as he still _works_ he usually doesn’t feel much damage. “Let me get my boots off.”

He takes off his jacket and sits down on the bed. His right foot is fine. Definitely bleeding, but it’s not terrible, just a broken blister at his heel. His left foot, on the other hand… “Ah, fuck.”

It doesn’t hurt but that’s because his nerves seem to have gone completely offline. It probably _should_ hurt. It’s swollen up completely, so he can’t even get his boot off.

“What’s the matter? Let me see.” Iris is on her knees in front of him with the first aid kit in her hand before Prompto can protest. “What the _hell,_ Prompto? You were walking on that all day?”

She sounds so much like Gladio that Prompto almost laughs. “It’s fine. It doesn’t hurt,” he says, trying to reassure her, but she just gives him a disbelieving look.

“That’s worse,” she says. “Hold still, okay?” She cracks the potion over his ankle without waiting for an answer.

The tingling healing magic sinks right into Prompto’s bones, and he feels things straighten out and knit back together. Iris tugs his boot off and his socks, too, frowning as she checks him over for more injuries. “Can you feel your toes now?”

“You didn’t have to waste that on - yeah, ow, they’re fine,” Prompto says as she pokes him in the shin, hard.

“Don’t be stupid,” she tells him. “I mean, I’d _try_ to carry you back to the facility, but…”

“Okay, okay. Thanks.”

Iris sits up on the bed next to him and pulls his foot into her lap to keep looking at it. The potion didn’t take care of all of the damage, and Iris finds more bruising higher up Prompto’s leg. She scowls at it and says, “You shouldn’t have done that.”

“I wasn’t gonna make you come up here yourself,” Prompto protests, trying not to twitch as she prods at the bruise. “Hey, that’ll heal up, don’t worry. I want to save the elixirs for Aranea.”

“I shouldn't've let you destroy it. What will the King do when you come back empty handed?” Iris asks. “You have to keep your cover, or you’ll end up like Cor.”

Prompto hadn’t realized that she was worried about _him_. He didn’t expect it, and it’s kind of her. But he knows what he has to do. “It’ll be fine. I’ve spent more time lying to Noct than telling the truth to him.”

Iris’s eyebrows knit together. Maybe she wasn’t expecting that truth bomb. “What will you tell him?”

“That we got in over our heads. Immortalis was too powerful, and we had to destroy it, because it would’ve wreaked havoc on Insomnia if we got it that far. The damage it did to the town should help my case.” Prompto puts his hands over his face as he tries to imagine Noct’s reaction. He’s going to have to be careful how he presents it. And no matter how much talking he does, he still got five Glaives killed - still pulled the trigger on one himself. He doesn’t know how he feels about going against Noct, but he’ll be carrying those deaths with him for a long time.

“I hope it works. Don’t get yourself killed. You’re too useful,” Iris says.

It’s the kind of thing Prompto would expect to hear out of Aranea, not Iris. He sits up in surprise. Iris only lets him catch her eye for a moment, and then bends to rummage in the first aid kit again. But Prompto can see her lip trembling.

“I won’t,” he says.

“Cor said that too,” Iris replies. “I hope you’re a better liar than he was.”

Prompto, hesitantly, puts an arm around her shoulders. He figures it’s about fifty-fifty whether she’ll get up or start crying. He doesn’t expect her to collapse, pressing her head against his chest.

“Hey, it’s gonna be okay,” he tells her, trying to convince himself just as much. “Promise.”

She takes a deep breath, and then another, and Prompto recognizes the signs of somebody about to put a cheerful mask back on. He cups her face in his hand and pulls back just enough to press his forehead against hers. “It doesn’t have to be okay _now_. I mean, have you seen me? I’m a mess.”

Iris breaks up, not quite crying, but breathing in that hitched way that’s almost sobs. “You should be _more_ of a mess. After today… I knew going in there that I’d have to kill Crownsguard, but you…”

She’s not wrong. Prompto flashes back to Sera’s face as she fell to the ground and, shuddering, puts the memory aside. “It’s not the first time,” he says. Noct doesn’t always leave that stuff to Gladio. “I don’t want to think about it.”

“I told Imber to kill the Glaives if he could,” Iris says, so quietly Prompto almost doesn’t hear her. “I knew they’d try to kill us. I didn’t _want_ them to die.”

Prompto pulls her a little closer; she’s nearly in his lap at this point, and she doesn’t seem to mind. “It’s gonna be okay,” he tells her again.

She doesn’t say anything after that; instead she leans up and presses her lips to his. Prompto’s heart skips a beat. “Iris?”

“Do you want to?” she asks. She’s kneeling up over him so he has to lean back a little to look into her eyes.

Prompto’s done this before. After fights, after _surviving_ , it feels good to know that there’s somebody else alive with you. And it’s been a long, long time since Prompto’s been with someone he doesn’t have to pretend with. He reaches up, runs his fingers through Iris’s short hair, and kisses her back.

She pushes him back onto the bed and straddles his legs all in one move. He should’ve expected her strength, but it takes him by surprise. It’s _hot_. He pulls her closer, and when their lips touch she licks into his mouth and turns the kiss absolutely filthy.

Then it’s a scramble to get enough of their clothes off to make it work, Prompto’s fingers slipping on the zipper to her jumpsuit, her hands down the back of his pants, both of them breathing heavy right against each other. When they’re mostly naked she stops and holds his wrists down to the mattress, biting her lip, almost daring him to do something about it.

She looks like a goddess. Prompto’s not the toughest, but he’s usually at least evenly matched with women. He’s never gotten pinned like this by someone smaller than him and felt like there’s no chance he’s getting loose. He makes a strangled moan, and Iris looks triumphant as she sinks down onto him.

***

Afterwards, Prompto pulls himself out of bed, and Iris watches him put water on to boil and pull ramen noodles out of the cabinet. He’s never been here before but these little cabins are all pretty much the same, and even if they weren’t, there’s only so much space in which stuff could be hiding. He finds the tea Iris mentioned and makes them each a cup. Iris sits up, wrapped in the blankets, to take it from him.

“Don’t think I’ll be able to make it to Gladio’s standards, but it’s food,” Prompto says as he drops noodles in the pot.

“Gladdy cares way too much about instant noodles,” Iris says. “It’ll be good.”

Prompto sets two steaming bowls out on the tiny table, and they both shovel the food down like they’re starving. Prompto’s been trying to get out of that habit, but sometimes it comes back when he’s under stress. As soon as his stomach is full, he feels his eyes dragging closed. He doesn’t know if he’ll actually sleep, but his body wants him to try.

“You can take the bed,” Prompto says, even though he desperately does not want to sleep on the floor. “Least I can do.”

She shakes her head like he’s crazy. “We’ll both fit. Unless you’re going to kick me like Gladdy always does.”

“Uh… probably not,” he says.

“Good. Besides, it’ll be warmer with both of us under the covers.”

She has a point. It’s warmer than outside by a long shot but still not exactly comfortable, and it’ll get colder overnight. He gets into bed as ordered and watches her put the lights out and clean up the kitchen.

She slides in next to him when she’s done. That puts her between him and the door, which makes him feel kind of like an asshole. Anything comes through there, she’ll get hit with it first.

“We’re not in enemy territory. Chill,” Iris tells him, when he hasn’t relaxed an inch after about fifteen minutes. “Besides, I’d protect you.”

Prompto laughs and lets out a breath, trying to let the tension out of his muscles. “Would you?”

“‘Course I would,” Iris says sleepily. She rolls over on her side and reaches out for him. Prompto isn’t exactly prepared to fight back, and it’s extremely easy to let himself be pulled in against her chest. She breathes deeply and steadily, and soon Prompto does, too.

***

By mutual, silent agreement, they get out of bed an hour before sunrise. Their gear has dried out by the heater, at least, and Iris makes more noodles and tea, so getting slapped in the face with the cold air outside is just about bearable.

They don’t talk about last night, but it’s not awkward. There just doesn’t seem to be much need for it. Instead Prompto talks about nothing, about the book Gladio’s been writing and the new garden they’re planting near the Citadel, shying away from anything to do with Noct directly. Iris humors him and even tells him a bit about her hobbies - she’s sewing clothes, now, when she has time.

About two hours in, they come to a cave. To Prompto it looks exactly like every other cave they’ve passed, today and yesterday, but Iris stops and looks at a small pile of rocks outside the entrance. Then she nods. “This is it,” she says. “Wait in here. I’ll get Aranea.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. She’s not going to like that you’re here,” Iris adds. “It’ll be easier if I explain first.”

“How long do I wait before I rescue you?” is Prompto's only other worry.

It’s been five minutes by his watch. She said give her fifteen. He is going to give her fifteen and not a six-damned _second_ more than that.

He hears a scratching noise at the cave entrance. “Iris?”

It isn’t Iris. It’s Aranea, looking not a day older than the last time he saw her, wielding a brand new gun. The gun is pointed straight at his face. On the upside, she doesn’t have her finger on the trigger.

“What the hell are you doing here?” she asks.

“Uh… long time no see,” Prompto says weakly. “Hi, Aranea.”

Aranea snorts. “No kidding. I don’t want to shoot you, blondie, but I will unless you give me a good explanation right now. I can’t have Crownsguard poking around my shit. How’d you find this place?”

“Trust me, I did _not_ think you wouldn’t. Um, I’m working with Iris.” And where _is_ Iris? This seems like exactly the kind of thing she was trying to stop from happening.

Aranea raises an eyebrow. “Funny how Iris didn’t mention that last time I saw her.”

“She wouldn’t’ve. I’m new,” Prompto says.

“Yeah? Did you join up with us before or after you arrested the Marshal?”

Over Aranea’s shoulder, Prompto can see a black shape moving around the entrance of the cave, stark against the blinding white of the snow. He gets ready to move, and Aranea catches where he’s looking, but not fast enough.

Iris launches herself into the cave and then _at_ Aranea. Arenea’s gun goes off as Prompto dodges - she wasn’t fucking around - but Aranea herself goes down hard _._ Iris tackles her and the gun flies out of her hand. Iris wins the scuffle, with one hand on Aranea’s throat and the other pinning her gun hand over her head.

“He’s with me,” Iris says, her voice low and threatening.

“Okay, okay, _fine_ , fuck,” Aranea says. Her other hand goes up, too, and the knife she had in it drops to the ground. “I won’t shoot him without shooting you first. Let me up.”

Iris lets up, putting herself between Prompto and Aranea as Aranea gets to her feet and picks her gun back up.

“What are _you_ doing out here, kiddo?” she asks, folding her arms. “Didn’t expect to see you after what happened to the Marshal.”

“We got stuck out here on a mission.” Iris relaxes a little, now that Aranea’s not obviously about to shoot them both. “We need transport for six back to Gralea. We can pay.”

Aranea looks at them with a bit more consideration. “Can you now? I thought the Crownsguard had everything locked up.”

“Lucky us, I’m still a Crownsguard, at least until Noct finds out I did this,” Prompto says cheerily.

Aranea huffs. “You finally grew a spine of your very own, huh?” she asks. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

It’s not as much as Prompto would like. There’s only so much that Noct gave him access to for this mission. But Aranea _almost_ smiles as he pulls elixirs out and lays them on the ground in front of her.

“Not bad,” she says, when he grabs the last bottle he has out of the air, and presents it to her with a bow. “This should keep us going for a few months. It’ll get you your ride, but only to the train station. I'm not going into town."

Aranea’s transport ship is tiny, and Prompto can see why Aranea doesn't want them all packed in there for too long. There’s only four passenger seats. Laguna and his fucked leg get one, Vivus another, Kiros sits on Ward’s lap, and Iris winds up perched on Prompto.

“We have to get our story straight for the King,” Prompto says as they rise into the air. “Are you ready to lie to him, Crownsguard?”

Vivus goes ash grey, but he nods. The story they come up with isn’t too far out of what really happened. Immortalis crashed their airship. The other four Crownsguard died in the wreckage. They had to hike to a local village, where they bartered for a snowmobile to get back to the train.

“Don’t say anything about what we traded. Just say we got one. Then if you’re nervous and someone presses you, you can say we got it for an elixir. Tell ‘em it was my idea,” Prompto adds.

The most important thing, of course, is that there was never a single other person around at all.

Prompto doesn’t think Vivus will talk. The kid has never been too outspokenly loyalist, like a lot of the Glaives are.

Aranea drops them off a good couple miles away from the train station. At least it’s downhill. They take turns helping Laguna walk and don’t make terrible time.

It’s weird how relaxed Prompto feels out here. It’s freezing, but for the first time in a _long_ time he’s not worried about anyone overhearing him if he were to talk openly. He sort of forgot that it hasn’t always been as bad as it is in the Citadel. He drops to the back of the group, and Iris falls into step beside him.

“It’s pretty out here,” he says, watching his breath make clouds in the air.

“You weren’t saying that yesterday,” Iris teases.

“It’s my Niflheimer genes reasserting themselves. I got too cold for too long.” He’s not lying, though. He likes the way the snow looks in the sunlight, even if he isn’t the biggest fan of the icy wind that comes with it.

Iris leans against his side, and Prompto puts an arm around her as they walk. He wonders if kissing her again would work out. Could they be a _thing_? Or was he just the closest warm body?

“Hey, Prompto, it’s your turn to help this lug,” Kiros calls out from the front of the line, and Prompto has to put his question on hold.

***

Explaining to Noct that three Glaives died and they still didn’t get Immortalis is not an experience Prompto ever wants to repeat. It’s not like Noct gets _mad_ exactly - he doesn’t yell or anything. He still doesn’t do that much. He gets… scary.

“You’ll have to tell the families,” he says.

Prompto, down on one knee below the throne, just says, “Yes, your Majesty.”

“Specs, can you make sure the punishment is open? I want people to see that I’m not playing favorites, here. Sorry, Prompto.” He even looks kind of upset about it, which is probably the best Prompto is getting.

“Yes, your Highness. I’ll invite the families directly as well.” Ignis looks Prompto over, and Prompto quickly ducks his head again. It won’t be that bad. Probably.

It’s not _that_ bad. Prompto gets thirty lashes and a potion afterward. He can take it.

Worse is going around to the families of the Glaives he got killed. One of them only had a younger sister, and she won’t even look at him, too scared of his uniform. One of them has a father who yells at Prompto and a mother who holds him back and apologizes profusely, all but throwing herself on the ground at Prompto’s feet.

Back in the day Prompto would’ve told Noct about that and Noct probably would have gone around himself to apologize and try to reassure the family. Now? Prompto just promises he won’t say anything and hopes they don’t worry themselves to death before they figure out he was telling the truth.

***

Back in the Citadel, Ignis and Gladio treat him like nothing ever happened. It’s not the first time one of them has caught a punishment from Noct and Prompto’s pretty sure it won’t be the last. He buckles down into his work, trying to ignore his new gnawing worry about Iris and her comrades.

There’s Crownsguard and Glaives to train. Delicately, he volunteers to help Ignis track the news coming out of Niflheim and Tenebrae; he’s a lot more interested in that stuff now that he knows it might do some good for Iris. And then there’s his classic best friend duty of dragging Noct off for some video game cool down time when he gets too angry in court.

He knows he manages to act normal around Noct, because Noct seems to just forget the whole Immortalis incident, and if he was suspicious of Prompto, he would definitely have him arrested at the least.

He’s less sure he’s normal around Gladio and Ignis. He’s trying to navigate not being _too_ interested in the foreign affairs report, and it hurts every time he has to commiserate with Gladio about missing his sister instead of just telling him she’s doing okay.

At least as okay as the rest of them are.

Imber was right about what Noct’s doing with them. The three of them get to train together, but they don’t get sent out on missions. They don’t get to be alone with each other without either Noct or a bunch of Noct’s loyal Crownsguard being around them. Ever since Cor got caught, Noct doesn’t really trust _anybody_.

When he asks Noct about it - casually, like, “Hey, we wanna go out together, it’ll be like old times!” - Noct says that he’s too worried about them to send them all out at once. Like, if he lost all of them at once he’d probably go insane.

Nice turn of phrase. Prompto tries to let it pass him by. “C’mon dude, do you think we can’t handle ourselves on one hunting trip? We managed it for ten years, and we’re not _that_ old.”

“It’s not the daemons I’m worried about,” Noct says. “You know Lucis still isn’t safe. There’s people out there who’d hurt you three to get at me.”

Prompto thinks about Iris’s friends and thinks, well, probably not hurt _him_. Probably. “What? That’s nuts, bro. People love you.”

It’s mostly true, though less true over the last couple years than in the first year or two after Noct came back. It takes a long time for the shine to wear off of making the sun rise again.

Noct shrugs. “I’d just rather be careful.”

When Prompto leaves his meeting with Noct, Gladio corners him. There’s still plenty of people around so it’s not like they’re in private, but Prompto still feels kind of weird about it. They both know that Noct doesn’t like them talking alone.

“Everything okay with Noct?” Gladio asks a bit gruffly.

“Yeah. Yeah, it’s fine,” Prompto says. Because they don’t say it. It’s blatantly obvious what’s happening, but talking about it would be like… making it real. And probably get them both lined up for another one of Noct’s “punishments”.

“Uh-huh,” Gladio says.

Gladio’s had it out with Noct directly. More than once - more than a few times, really. He only stopped when Ignis started intervening. Now he hangs back in Council meetings, sometimes arguing when Noct says something really dumb, but mostly just letting things happen.

“You know how it is. He’s kind of a dick but it’s fine,” Prompto says. Brush it off. Prompto never lets Gladio get anywhere when he starts fishing around for Prompto’s opinion on Noct. He’s always been too scared before and now he’s afraid he’d just blab about Iris.

“Have it your way. You recovered?” Gladio asks. He doesn’t say from what, but shit, Prompto knows.

“Yeah, good to go. The potion got most of it.”

“Great. You’re coming to the training hall with me.”

Gladio kicks Prompto’s ass, as usual, and Prompto feels a little bit better about things.

***

It’s not enough to keep him in the Citadel, though. By the next day, with his guilt assuaged, he’s looking to get out into the city again. He doesn’t even go with the intent of finding Iris, this time; he just wants to get away from… everyone. All his friends. Noct, especially, if he’s more honest with himself than he wants to be.

After morning court - not all that dramatic today, which is just the way Prompto likes it - and some target drills with the new class of Crownsguard, Prompto heads into the streets in full uniform. The royal black is a blessing and a curse. No one wants to talk to him, but no one wants to get in his way, either.

Prompto’s not _going_ anywhere in particular so his feet take him down his old patrol path. It may’ve been years since he walked it regularly, but he remembers. Left out of the Citadel grounds. Down to Somnent Way, then left again, setting him on a path towards what used to be restaurants and is now the Niflheimer part of town.

It doesn’t take long for him to come upon a knot of people all watching something ahead of them, blocking the path. If Prompto actually had this route, he’d have to do something about this. But, as he sees once he shoulders his way through the group, the Crownsguard are already represented here.

The Guard - Prompto knows him, of course. This guy’s name is Unitas and he’s Insomnian born and bred. He’s got his sword out and he’s nearly but not _quite_ brandishing it at the man and two kids in front of him. That’s not a surprise, unfortunately. What _is_ a surprise is that Prompto knows the man, too: Iris’s teammate, Laguna.

Laguna says something and Unitas pushes his shoulder. Laguna lets him, but keeps himself between Unitas and the children. Prompto’s pretty sure he won’t let those kids go without a fight, but it’s nice to see he doesn’t want to jump to pulling out his gun in the middle of the street. Prompto walks out into the center of the circle of watching citizens, unsure of what his plan is but sure he’s got to do _something_.

***

Iris pulls her hood up when she sees the group gathered at the street corner. That many people in one place is never a good sign in this part of town - that’s why she and Laguna picked it for this meeting. Part of the work that they’re doing involves getting as many people out of Niflheim as possible, and sometimes that means they have to stay in the city for a while, dangerous as it can be. So far, it’s gone well - in the last six months, they’ve gotten five families through to Altissia. But, as Iris sidles through the crowd, it seems apparent that their luck has run out.

The Crownsguard talking to Laguna pushes him back, and Laguna stumbles. Iris can almost see the calculations running through his head: too many witnesses to start a firefight, but no real leverage to talk his way out of this one, either. Iris steps through to the front of the circle and hesitates. She can fight everyone here if she has to, but…

On the other side of the circle, the crowd parts, revealing another Crownsguard uniform. Iris’s heart sinks, but then she recognizes the hair. It’s Prompto. Iris could kiss him for showing up right then.

“What’s up, Unitas?” Prompto asks. His eyes flick over the crowd, but if he recognizes her, he plays dumb about it. “Aren’t you on duty?”

“Yes, Commander,” the Crownsguard says stiffly. “This is official business. These two are illegally in the city.”

Iris holds her breath. She knew they weren’t going to be able to keep this up forever, but she was really hoping it wouldn’t come down to a direct confrontation with the Crownsguard.

Prompto’s blue eyes go wide. “What? This guy?”

“No, Commander. The children.”

“Seriously, Unitas? We’re not carding kids.” Prompto looks down at the children. “Is this your dad?” he asks the girl.

“That’s Uncle Laguna,” she says. “We’re staying with him.”

“Where are your parents?” Prompto asks.

“My sister died during the long night,” Laguna explains. It’s a blatant lie - Laguna’s never even had a sister - but all the kids know enough to go along with it.

Prompto nods. “Sorry to hear that. And you’re Insomnian?”

“Do I _look_ like a Nif?” Laguna says, with just the right amount of sneer. Prompto smiles a little wider. _Prompto_ , though Iris never thought about it much until lately, looks like a poster boy for Nif ideals.

“Let’s see your ID,” Prompto says.

Laguna’s ID is as fake as his relationship to those kids. Iris holds her breath as Prompto looks it over. The other Crownsguard looks annoyed at being ignored, but Prompto outranks all of them; he might just pull this off.

“It’s fine,” Prompto declares eventually. He folds the paper up and hands it back to Laguna without letting the other Crownsguard get a good look at it.

“Commander,” the Crownsguard protests, but Prompto shoots him a cold look and he shuts up.

“He’s fine. Keep an eye on him if you want, but I’m guessing you’re not going to see anything, right, Lacus?”

Laguna nods. “Yes, sir. Trust me, we’re really boring.”

“See? It’s all good,” Prompto says, and then raises his voice. “C’mon, everybody. Nothing left to see here. Let’s go.” He puts a hand on the Crownguard’s shoulder and walks him off, and the crowd disperses too.

Iris follows Prompto and the Crownsguard at a safe distance for a while, until they’re a safe distance away from Laguna and his charges, and her racing heart has calmed down.

***

Prompto’s been spending more time with Gladio lately. He hasn’t quite made up his mind if he should talk about Iris yet, but he keeps _almost_ doing it - and Gladio seems happy enough to kick his ass whenever Prompto wants to spar.

Today, around the third or fourth round of ass-kicking, Noct comes into the room. He watches the two of them until Gladio pins Prompto to the floor. As Prompto frantically taps out - Gladio knows _exactly_ how strong he is and has no fear of using it - Noct comes over to them. When Gladio stands up, Noct holds out a hand to help Prompto get up after him.

Prompto takes it and pulls himself up. Noct’s skin is a little too warm, and Prompto knows he’s been with the Crystal again.

“I need to borrow him for a minute,” Noct tells Gladio.

“He’s all yours, Your Majesty.” Gladio bows to Noct the same way he used to bow to Noct’s dad. He’s more comfortable with the court stuff than Prompto is, but Prompto knows he feels just as weird about doing it with Noct.

“Thanks. C’mon, Prompto.”

Noct drags Prompto up to his private office, where he can show Prompto his maps and plans. Even Ignis isn’t there, which is absolutely out of the ordinary. Prompto feels his spine stiffen as he walks through the door.

“There’s been unrest in Altissia, again,” Noct says.

“Seriously? I thought you smacked them down last time.” Prompto doesn’t just _think_ , he _knows_. There was a protest in Altissia last year, and Noct had Ignis put it down. Prompto reviewed the field reports from the Glaives who came back. He’s amazed Altissia still has the nerve to say anything.

“They’re stubborn. My dad never had the chance to bring them in, but I do now.” Noct pulls out some files from under his desk. One of Ignis’s dossiers and a bunch of newspaper clippings. “I want to send a real force this time. I went over it with Specs. We’ll have someone I can trust take the Secretary’s place.”

“You’re going to stage a coup?” Prompto asks blankly. Then, when Noct raises an eyebrow at him, he says, “Well, I guess you tried everything else.”

“Exactly. I’m gonna have Ignis take the lead, and I want you to be ready in case he needs backup. I trust him, but Altissia is rough. There have been riots, and then they closed down the borders…”

The details go by in a blur. Prompto thinks he satisfies Noct, anyway. He doesn’t say anything stupid and he manages to ask all the right questions. The whole time, he’s wondering how Noct blindsided him with this one. He’s been keeping track of everything that’s gone past Ignis’s desk lately. It doesn’t feel right.

But he keeps a lid on it. Noct beams at him when they get through it and then he invites Prompto to come play games with him. It’s so rare that Prompto isn’t the one making the invite that he can’t make himself say no. He even relaxes enough to get into it some.

But then he has to go back to his room, and think about _that_ Noct versus King Noctis who’s about to order a whole bunch of civilians arrested or killed and maybe start a war because they pointed out he’s bad at his job, and… well…

As soon as it’s dark Prompto slips out of the Citadel and back down to the Voretooth’s Den. He’s surprised to find Ward behind the bar. The guy still doesn’t talk, but he does pick up his phone and send a text when Prompto asks him about Iris. And Iris is there ten minutes later.

She surprises the hell out of him by greeting him with a kiss on the cheek, but before he can make it a _thing_ , she drags him off to a table in the back corner. “What’s the matter?” she asks. “It’s safe enough to talk here. You can tell me.”

“I can’t just want to see you?” Prompto asks. Iris lifts an eyebrow, skeptically, and Prompto sighs. “I mean, I wanted to see you too.”

“It isn’t safe enough for us to meet only for that,” Iris says. She’s right, but it sucks. In a less shitty world, Prompto would’ve asked her out on a real date by now. She used to tag along to the arcade sometimes when they were kids. She was really good at dancing games and fighters. Maybe they could go camping, like going on missions but without having to kill something at the end of it. That would be fun.

“Okay, yeah, you’re right,” Prompto says. “I - look, Noct’s got something going in Altissia. I didn’t know who else to tell.” He glances around and lowers his voice. “He’s going to invade.”

Iris’s face goes pale. “Why would he do that? What could Altissia possibly have done…”

“Just existed, as far as I can tell. It’s not that he wants to hurt anybody. Exactly. But I think he like… wants to make them part of Lucis again. There’ve been demonstrations against him, and then somebody from Lucis got turned away at their border. So.”

“What is he _doing_?” Iris asks. She sounds just as defeated by it as Prompto feels.

He reaches out and takes her hand, and then he _says_ it, lets out all the nearly-treasonous thoughts that he’s been keeping locked up for this entire time. It comes out in a stream of consciousness rush. “He doesn’t remember anything he was fighting for. He’s _gone_ , Iris, I don’t know what the fucking Crystal is doing to him but he’s not Noct anymore. He’s killing his people off and he’s wrecking - he should’ve stayed in the Crystal. If it was going to be like this. We should’ve stayed in the dark.”

“You can’t mean that,” Iris protests, but he thinks it’s just for something to say. She wraps her fingers around his and squeezes.

“It’s not just about the _world_. It’s _him_. He’s against everything he used to stand for. I promised him we’d knock down the borders. He didn’t want anybody to fight because of where they were born. And now he’s like this. I’d do better getting what he wanted than he is…”

Prompto stops, because that _is_ treason. He’s never worried about that before but he grew up in a monarchy and he knows the rules. Even under Regis you could get in trouble for saying stuff like that and meaning it.

Under Noct, you can end up dead for it.

Iris is looking at him very thoughtfully. “Would you?” she asks. “I don’t want to move against the King if I can help it, Prompto. But…. Would you?”

She’d be happier, probably, if he’d lie. He could say yeah, absolutely he’d do it, no problem. It’s what he would say to Noct, if Noct asked him to do… anything. Instead he sighs. “I don’t want to. But I would if I had to.”

Iris nods. “I don’t want to, either, but I’m not sure I trust anyone else.”

“Yeah. I get that,” Prompto says. “What are we going to do about it?”

“I wish I knew,” Iris says. She drops down next to him, making the bed shake, and her hand finds his. “I’m glad you understand, though. I’ve been so worried that all of you were gone.”

Prompto thinks about Ignis, perfectly happy to serve Noct in any possible way, and Gladio, who argues but still carries out his orders whenever he’s given them. And Prompto knows that he, himself, isn’t looking that great from the outside. He still does mostly whatever Noct wants.

“It’s hard to give up on a guy when you’ve known him for that long.”

“I know. But I think all of you have to,” Iris says.

She probably does know. She’s known Noct even longer than Prompto has, after all, and she’s seen him from the outside since he came back to Insomnia. “Do you know anyone in Altissia?” he asks. “If we can warn them, we might be able to keep people safe.”

“None of my team is there right now,” Iris says. “I was supposed to take those children out today, but I’ll have to wait, now. The Crownsguard are watching Laguna.”

“Sorry about that,” Prompto says. “I don’t think I can tell ‘em to drop it without making them suspicious.” If he’d thought things through, he might’ve taken Laguna into custody himself, and let him off with the kids later, but at the time he’d kind of panicked.

“No, you saved them. And maybe it’s good. This way I can take the message to them myself.”

“I should go too,” Prompto says. “I know Ignis. I can help.”

“Won’t the King realize you’re not on his side?”

Prompto shrugs. “Yeah. But if I’m there, if I can help you guys out without getting you in more trouble… I don’t know. It’s worth it.”

***

Two days later, Prompto heads downtown so Iris can pick him up on her motorcycle. It’s less conspicuous than trying to take one of the Crown cars. It’ll be a long trip, but Prompto’s pretty sure the two of them will be fine. Prompto slides on behind her, wraps his arms around her waist, and smiles as she revs the engine.

“Vivus is at the east gate,” he tells her. “I made sure. He’ll let us through if we go that way.”

Prompto’s expecting the real trouble to happen after they leave the city, but he doesn’t get that much of a break. As they get closer to the gate traffic slows down. There’s always a pause at the gates leaving and entering the city as the Guard make sure you’re allowed to come or go, but this seems worse than usual. Left without many options, they get into line behind a big white van.

It becomes obvious before long: the Guards are searching all the cars. Prompto sees a Crownsguard knock one woman on her ass outside her car when she protests.

“I haven’t heard Noct was planning a border check,” Prompto says into Iris’s ear, and feels her body go tense against him. She’s not any happier about this than he is.

“Could he have known we’d be headed out?” Iris asks. “I don’t see my contact anywhere.”

“I didn’t tell him. But we’ve gotta assume he’s looking for you. You better run.”

“You’re not supposed to be here either.”

Prompto isn’t, and he’s already jittery thinking about how he’s going to explain this to Noct. But that’s kind of beside the point. “I can get caught, you can’t.”

“I’m not going to just _leave_ you here,” Iris protests.

“Yes you are, if I can’t talk my way out of this I fully believe you can rescue me later, now _go_.” Prompto pushes at her shoulders until she gets off the bike and he can slide into the front of the saddle. “We’ll meet up later if we can. Do _not_ let them catch you.”

Iris doesn’t move, just frowns at him for a minute; then she leans in and kisses him, hard. Prompto isn’t expecting it and their teeth clash, and then she bites his lower lip hard enough to leave a bruise. “Don’t you _dare_ get yourself killed,” she says when she pulls away.

“Yes, ma’am,” he tells her, licking his lip. The car in front of them starts rolling forward, and Iris takes the opportunity to head off the highway and towards the narrow band of trees at the side of the road. Prompto holds his breath until she’s out of sight. _Safe_ , he thinks.

Then it’s just a waiting game, his anxiety ticking higher, until the white van in front of him is searched and allowed through and he comes face to face with one of the Crownsguard kids. And the business end of the kid’s gun.

“Hey there, Crownsguard,” he says, projecting as much chill as he can, keeping his hands on the handles. “You can put that down. I’m on official business.”

The Crownsguard - shit, what is his name. Fornax, maybe? - lifts his radio. His eyes never leave Prompto as he says, “I’ve got him. I need backup.”

***

The Crownsguard deliver him to Ignis first. As far as Prompto was aware Ignis left for Altissia yesterday, so it’s kind of a surprise to get dragged into his office and find him sitting right there in his desk chair.

“Hey, Igster,” Prompto says, trying to smile. “Thought you were out of town.”

Ignis doesn’t even pretend to take the bait. “Did you really try to leave the city? Prompto, _why_? I know you don’t have anywhere to be but here.”

“It’s the weekend,” Prompto says. “I was gonna visit Cindy.” Cindy’s not in Hammerhead, but as far as Prompto knows, she’s been keeping all her movements quiet.

“On Iris Amicitia’s motorbike?” Ignis asks. Prompto does what he thinks is a pretty good job of hiding his surprise, but Ignis is Ignis. He definitely notices. And he stands up from his chair and pulls his gloves on.

“Court is in session. We’re going to go see His Majesty.”

“You really think this is worth bothering him about?”

“He’ll want to know,” Ignis says.

Prompto tries to pull himself together. This should be fine. He’s lied to Noct _lots_ of times. Most of the first four years they knew each other, really. He gives Ignis a shaky smile. “Alright, then, but don’t blame me when he whines at you for wasting his time.”

Ignis frowns and walks out of the office, lifting a gloved hand to beckon the Crownsguard along. They each grab Prompto by a shoulder and march him down the quiet halls of the Citadel towards the throne room. Court’s in session, obviously. Gladio’s standing behind Noct, but otherwise the scene is pretty much the same as when Prompto dragged Cor in here not even a month ago.

All of those eyes on Prompto are even worse when he’s the one in the handcuffs, it turns out.

“Commander,” Noct says.

Unlike Cor, Prompto goes to one knee without being shoved down. It’s a little awkward in the handcuffs but he makes it work. “Your Majesty.”

He’s always felt weird about saying the title out loud. He never called Noct by any titles before, except at his Crownsguard swearing in, and even then Noct looked a little freaked out about it. But these days Noct insists on it, sometimes even when it’s just the two of them. It definitely can’t hurt in front of all these witnesses.

Noct doesn’t tell him to get up, which… isn’t great. Prompto lifts his head. Noct isn’t smiling; he looks deadly serious. Today he’s playing with something that looks like strands of shadow. It spirals up to the ceiling, spreads out in a sheet of darkness and makes the whole throne room look even taller and more imposing than it is.

“Explain yourself, Commander Argentum,” Noct says.

“C’mon Noct - Your Majesty,” Prompto says, trying for some balance between respect and reminding Noct that they’re still _best friends_. “A guy can’t go visit his hopeless crush on his day off?”

Noct rests his head on his hand, looking down at Prompto through half-lidded eyes. “It’s a weird weekend for you to pick.”

Prompto shrugs as best he can with his hands still behind his back. “I was going to be back by Sunday. I mean, Iggy’s here, so it’s fine, right?” Prompto says.

Ignis glares at him, and that shuts him up immediately, like it always has. “We know that only Commander Argentum thought there was a mission planned to Altissia,” Ignis says in that dry lawyer voice of his. “We have also discovered that the motorbike he was riding belonged to Iris Amicitia.”

Prompto sees Gladio jump from all the way down here. Meanwhile the bottom drops out of his stomach. The Altissia mission was a trap. Noct set him up as a loyalty test.

Noct’s _right_ , but it doesn’t actually make Prompto feel better about anything. The lack of trust Noct has in him, _or_ the knowledge that Noct has no reason to trust him anymore.

Prompto is too panicked to even plead for himself, and Noct looks at him for a long, _long_ time before he finally says, “Take him to the cells.”

***

As soon as Iris is behind the trees, well out of sight from the road, she breaks into a run, headed for the Citadel. She needs backup, she needs a plan - but contacting Laguna is out of the question, and no one else is in the city. She’s going to have to wing it.

She runs through the lower city where no one’s likely to stop her, but she has to slow down when she gets uptown, where there are people on the street. It gives her a minute to pull herself together and think. She gets her phone out and tunes in to the streaming radio service, just in time to hear the breaking news music finish up.

The newscaster goes into her story with no preamble. _“Crownsguard Commander Argentum, one of King Noctis’s closest confidants, has been taken into Crownsguard custody….”_

Iris tries to keep the distress off her face as she walks. The details are all there as they happen, which makes sense; Noctis wouldn’t want them kept secret. It’s no doubt his idea to have the trial - he has the nerve to call it a trial! - reported live. What the radio doesn’t tell her is what Prompto’s sentence will be.

But he’s not dead yet. They would have said that.

She does half a lap around the Citadel walls, staying out of sight of the guards at each entrance. No one she recognizes is there; she hopes Vivus is alright, wherever he got assigned to. 

She’s just wondering if she can climb the wall when her radio crackles, twice.

Iris lifts it to her mouth with her hand shaking. “Report,” she says.

“Iris? That you?” Gladio’s voice comes out of the speaker.

Iris nearly drops the thing. It’s been so long since she talked to Gladio. “Gladdy? How did you get that radio?”

“Stole it off our mutual friend,” Gladio says. “Where are you?”

“Outside the Citadel. Come get me?”

“Just hang on, kiddo. I’ll be right there.”

***

Noct cuts Prompto off from the armiger when Prompto is halfway down the stairs to the cell block. Prompto stumbles and nearly falls. He didn’t realize how aware he was of that connection to the Crystal’s magic until it’s gone. The Crownsguard manhandle him along until he gets his feet back under him, and he doesn’t get a minute to recalibrate until they lock the door behind him in his cell.

It’s the same cell they kept Cor in. Prompto wonders if that’s psychological tactics or what, but whether it’s on purpose or not it works.

The first person who comes to see him, aside from the Guard who’s been watching him, is Gladio. Prompto stands up when he sees him, entirely ready to fight if he has to. Not that he’ll stand a chance, with no weapons and being half the size of Gladio, but he’s not just going to _let_ himself get executed.

“Chill,” Gladio says. “I’m just visiting. This isn’t official business.”

Prompto relaxes only a fraction. “Sorry I can’t exactly invite you in,” he says.

Gladio snorts. “Yeah, I’ll live. It’s not all that homey anyway.”

“Tch, yeah, they wouldn’t let me decorate.” Gladio seems normal enough, which is a nice change. Prompto sits down on the bed.

“Do you know how long they’re going to keep me down here?” Prompto asks. He gave his entirely made up report to Iggy and a couple Crownsguard two days ago and hasn’t heard a word since.

Gladio shrugs. “However long it takes for Noct to find something else to freak out about, probably. If he doesn’t forget about you or decide he likes you better here.”

Both those possibilities are just way too easy to imagine happening. Prompto sits in silence for a minute.

What he wants to ask about is Iris. Is she here? She could be sneaking through the halls of the Citadel right now.

“Come over here,” Gladio says. Prompto, a bit nervous and a bit confused, comes up to the bars of the cell.

In a low voice, Gladio says, “I can’t let you out. But I got you this. If someone _does_ come by, you’ll be ready.” He slips a black-wrapped object through the bars of the cell. As soon as Prompto gets his hand on it, he knows what it is. His handgun. Nothing fancy, but it’ll keep Prompto in the game if he needs to fight.

“Thanks,” Prompto says.

Gladio leans forward and rests his head on the bars. He looks as tired as Prompto feels. “I’m going back up to Noct. I’m not gonna let anyone hurt him. You know that, right?”

“You don’t have to defend him,” Prompto says. If he were smart he’d have planned out something to say, convince Gladio that he needs to come over to their side, but he hasn’t. All he’s got is, “He’s not the same guy you promised to protect.”

“He’s still my king. I don’t know what you guys are planning. If you want to try and get him to step down that’s one thing. But he’s not going to die before I do.”

Prompto grabs the bars. “If I said something like that you’d beat some sense into me.”

He remembers too well when they _thought_ Noct had died, in those terrible minutes between the three of them pulling his body off the throne and the gods breathing life back into him. They’d both thought Ignis was about to try and follow Noct into death. Gladio had held his hands until Noct’s heart started beating again.

“Yeah, well. That’s not your job, it’s mine.”

***

It takes a while for Gladio to get out to her. Iris can’t stop moving, bouncing on her toes and jumping at every shadow. She hates waiting around before a fight. She just wants to get it over with.

When the gate cracks open, Iris has a knife in her hand before she can even think. Gladio’s hands go up in surrender.

“Thank gods, Gladdy,” Iris says. She hasn’t seen him in forever, since they picked different sides, and she’s so happy that he’s _here_ and willing to help her that she throws her arms around him in a hug.

He ruffles her hair and holds her tight - he gives the _best_ hugs - for as long as it feels like they can risk. “Prompto’s fine. He’s in the cells,” Gladio says when he lets her go. “You guys should get out of here.”

“Do you think we can?” Iris asks.

“I’ll take you to the cells, but you’ll have to take it from there. I’m supposed to be with Noct right now.”

Iris doesn’t like it, but she nods. He _does_ have a duty, after all. All she has to do right now is get Prompto out of here, and maybe they can figure the rest of it out later.

***

Prompto stashes the gun under his mattress and tries to look innocent when the Crownsguard come back into the room. Luckily, they don’t give him too much attention. No one really knows how to treat him, since being too nice or being too cruel could both invoke Noct’s wrath. He stares at the wall and waits. At least being a Crownsguard has prepared him for that.

Maybe two hours later, the Guards get a message on their radios. It’s code Prompto doesn’t know, which means either they were working fast or Noct’s been planning for Prompto to fuck him over for a while now. Whatever it’s about, it makes them scramble to attention and stand at the doorway to the cell block with their weapons drawn. Prompto feels his nerves kick into high gear.

“Hey Tegas, what’s up?” he calls over to one of the Guards.

Tegas looks at him and frowns. “Not your problem,” he says.

Prompto kind of can’t believe that’s all it took to get him to engage. He’ll have to see about the training unit on guarding prisoners. Still, it works out well for him. “Are you sure? It looks like you might be guarding me.”

“No one is getting in or out of this block,” he says, and then his partner - Celsa, Prompto thinks her name is - reaches over and shushes him.

“At least one of you was paying attention in training,” Prompto says cheerfully as he goes to sit down on his bed.

Tegas gives him a dirty look, but keeps his eyes on Prompto and his knives raised. Celsa has a nasty looking crossbow, but at least that’s pointed at the door. Prompto flops back on the bed.

“Fine, then, don’t talk to me,” he says, and while they’re making themselves ignore him, he pulls the gun out from under the mattress and unwraps it. Six rounds. He’d better make ‘em count. He tucks it behind him and settles in to wait again.

There’s more of that coded chatter on the radio, setting Prompto’s thoughts down a darker path again. How long has Noct suspected this? How long have they been lying to each other? Maybe if Prompto hadn’t pretended so hard that Noct was still his best friend they’d have had this out by now.

Prompto’s watching the door, past the eyes of the guards. So he’s the first one to see Iris’s face appear at the barred window. His expression must alert Tegas, because he turns to the door - and Celsa clocks him in the back of the head with the butt of her gun.

Prompto yells _something_ in surprise and Celsa smiles while she unlocks the door. “Come on in,” she says to Iris, stepping back.

Iris does, shutting the door behind her.

“I’m in Vivus’s unit,” Celsa says, by way of explanation, as she opens the door to Prompto’s cell. Prompto hurries to grab his gun and get out. "He told me what you did in Niflheim. Is it true you're trying to take down the King?" she asks Iris.

Iris looks at Prompto sideways, and then says, "That's not the plan today."

"When it is, let me know," Celsa says. "But get out of here now. I'll say you overpowered us both."

Prompto and Iris get halfway down the hall before Iris grabs him in an absolutely crushing hug.

“I swear I will kill you myself if that happens again," she mumbles into his shoulder.

Prompto strokes her hair. “I told you you'd save me.”

Iris shakes her head and pulls away from him. “Sorry. I'm wasting time. Do you know the best way out of here?”

Prompto does know, but he doesn't make a move. He's been worrying this over and he thinks it's time he got it out in the open. “I think… I’ve gotta see Noct first,” Prompto says.

“Are you serious? He was going to kill you.”

“No. He never said he would. I just need to try and explain things to him, okay? Give him a chance.”

Iris sighs and just _looks_ at him for a minute. “If we’re going to do that - confront the King. Then there’s something I want to do first. I want to take the oath for you,” she says. “If I have to protect you, I want to do it right."

It seems like it took a lot out of her, to say that. Prompto doesn’t even know what it’d mean. But if it’s so important to her, he can’t see a reason why he wouldn’t do it. He squeezes her hand. “Yeah, okay.”

Right then and there, on the marble floor of the hall, she takes a knee in front of him. “As a shield stands between the sword and the soldier, so do I swear to stand between you, my - Prompto, and all who may seek to harm you. You shall not fall while I draw breath.”

She’s done, and Prompto’s pretty sure there’s something he’s supposed to say, now, but he doesn’t know what it is. So he reaches out and runs his fingers through her short hair, tipping her head up. “Thank you,” he says.

Iris smiles. “Memorized that while Gladdy was practicing,” she says. Her eyes are a little _too_ bright. “I always wanted - but I’m glad I got to say it.”

Prompto doesn’t say anything about it, but he runs his thumb over her cheek, catching the tear that’s spilled. “I’ll try to deserve it,” he says.

“I’ll make sure you do,” she replies.

There’s this tense, frozen moment where Prompto thinks he should tell her to get up, and doesn’t, and she looks like she’s going to say something, and doesn’t. Prompto takes a couple tries at it and then takes her hand in both of his. “Thanks, Iris,” he says. His voice is a little rough.

She smiles, her eyes sad, and pulls herself to her feet. She bends down to kiss him once, gently. “Come on. His Majesty’s in the throne room. We’d better get up there before he catches on.”

Prompto nods and follows her through the empty halls.

It makes sense Noct would retreat to the throne. It feels like a weird mockery of five years ago, when Noct walked up to challenge Ardyn for the crown. Noct didn’t die then, even though he was supposed to.

For the first time in years, Prompto doesn’t bow when he enters the throne room. Noct is up on the throne, and Gladio and Ignis are with him. Prompto can hear them arguing as he and Iris get closer.

“I wasn’t gonna let you kill off anyone else,” Gladio says.

“I don’t have time for anyone I can’t trust,” Noct replies. Prompto can feel the sharp, static crackle of magic in the air as Noct gets to his feet. “Are you going against me too?”

“No. You’re stuck with me until one of us dies.”

“That _is_ a problem, huh,” Noct says. Like his anger taking form, the magic gets stronger. Prompto can see it flashing in Noct’s eyes.

Gladio sees it too, and steps back, his hands raised. “I won’t fight you, Your Majesty.”

“Good,” Noct says. The bolt of lightning hits Gladio square in the chest, and Gladio sprawls to the floor, his body nearly skidding off the dais.

Iris screams. Noct looks up, his eyes a glaring red, and the shadows collect around his hands again. Prompto can’t let him get his shit together. He shoves down the thought that Gladio’s probably _dead_ and charges up the stairs with his gun out and ready. He’s got his finger on the trigger exactly like Cor taught him _not_ to do anytime he was anywhere near royalty.

“You too?” Noct asks. He calls magic to his hands, fire and ice spinning together. Behind the glow of crystalline light, the shadows under his eyes make him look like he’s got the Scourge. “I should’ve known,” he says. “Everybody was just waiting to betray me.”

Prompto stops at the top of the steps and points his gun square at Noct’s head. His hand shakes, but he breathes through it. “Abdicate,” he says. He doesn’t really think it’ll work. “You don’t have to kill anyone else. You’re not helping Lucis and you know it.”

Ignis takes a step forward, and Noct waves him back. “It’s fine, Ignis. I can take care of this.”

“Your Majesty,” Ignis starts to protest, but the glare Noct shoots him is bright with anger, and he steps back.

“And _you_ know that’s not gonna work,” Noct says, echoing Prompto’s thoughts. “I’m the _King_.”

“Noct, please. I don’t want to kill you. Or anybody. But this has to stop.”

“It’s gonna stop,” Noct says. For a second he almost looks like himself again - serious and tired, determined. But then he smirks, and it’s gone. With that expression on his face, and the black around his eyes, he looks like Ardyn more than anyone.

Prompto’s finger twitches on the trigger. Noct could kill him with a thought, just like Gladio - but Prompto doesn’t want to believe it of him. He doesn’t want to think that after everything they’ve been through together, his best friend could still turn his power on him.

“I don’t want to hurt you, Prompto,” Noct says. The magic in his hands glows brighter. Prompto’s frozen, unable to commit to taking the shot. Noct won’t have any doubts about going for it - Prompto’s _seen_ that. He doesn’t want to die here.

He’s so, so focused on Noct’s expression that he doesn’t even hear Iris coming up the stairs. Suddenly she’s in front of him, her sword raised, planting herself firmly between Prompto and Noct.

“Iris,” Noct says, sounding shocked. But at the same time he unleashes his magic, no particular spell, just a blast of elemental energy that Iris catches and deflects with the flat of her sword. Prompto shields his eyes but Iris stands firm and swings her sword at Noct.

Noct warps away and Iris leaps after him, landing hard on her knees and one hand on the floor and immediately standing to bring her sword around again.

Prompto turns to watch them fight, trying to find an opening to shoot, but they’re moving too fast… and he’s forgotten about Ignis.

He remembers in a hurry when he feels the blade of Ignis’s knife against his throat.

“I knew you were working with her,” Ignis says, quietly, in Prompto’s ear. His voice doesn’t shake and the knife doesn’t waver. Prompto’s seen him kill in cold blood a hundred times and he knows exactly what it sounds like. “You would betray him, too?”

“No,” Prompto says. And suddenly, the guilt is gone. He’s _not_ betraying Noct. His best friend, the king he loved? That guy isn’t here anymore. And he’s not coming back. “You know I wouldn’t, Ignis. C’mon.”

“I wish I did know that, but you make it hard to believe,” Ignis says. “Explain yourself.”

“Can you put the knife down, dude?”

“I think not.”

“Alright,” Prompto says, taking a deep breath. He raises his hands, and Ignis takes the gun away. Prompto feels naked without it. “Are you gonna kill me, too?” he asks.

“Call her off, and maybe Noct will accept your apology.”

“Okay. Okay, sure.” Prompto raises his voice. “Iris!”

Iris steps away from Noct before she looks up to see Prompto. She takes in the scene, and Prompto sees her start towards them, still looking at Noct - but Prompto’s voice has caught Noct’s attention, too.

“Stand down!” Prompto shouts down to her. She looks at Noct and lets her sword fall.

Noct’s ignoring her. Prompto’s the target of his anger now. He warps back up to the dais and stands in front of Prompto, his chest heaving. He must be getting close to exhausted by now, but the bright, formless magic around his hands shows no sign of weakening.

"Are you sure about this, Noct?" Prompto asks. He's only stalling, he thinks, but it stops Noct cold. He looks down at Gladio's body sprawled across the floor, and the Crystal's light around him flickers. Prompto feels Ignis's grip on his shoulder loosen.

"This isn't how I wanted it to go," Noct says, his voice raw from yelling. "I just -"

He stops, looking over Prompto's shoulder. Then he nods. "Yeah. That's it."

Prompto and Ignis both turn to look, and as Prompto sees Iris coming up the steps behind him he understands. He'd fight it, but he doesn't have time. Noct charges. No magic. Just a rush of pure helpless anger. He'd hurt Prompto with his bare hands, no doubt about it, but Iris is faster than he is. She takes a dancing step to get between them and Noct runs right into her sword.

Ignis catches Noct before his body hits the floor.

***

When Noct died the daemons went with him. Prompto wonders if that's what was supposed to happen five years ago. Noct might have been hailed as a hero. Instead, when they tell the story of what happened in the throne room, it's Iris Daemon-Slayer who gets that treatment. Prompto's glad of it. None of them are sure what's going to happen next, but if Prompto has any say in it, he'll put Iris in charge and let it go from there.

Iris has to quell a lot of protest, but they give Noct a decent burial. Prompto digs the grave with his own hands. Gladio’s grave is right next to his. Prompto feels weird about it, but Iris insisted.

Ignis disappears for a few days, but he attends the funeral. Prompto refused to keep him under guard. Without Noct, he doesn't seem like a threat. Under other circumstances, he would’ve been the one to give Noct’s eulogy; they talked about it, once, during the long night when they used to talk about important things. Instead, he and Prompto give their silent respects side by side, while Iris lays a wreath of flowers on each headstone.


End file.
